Neal Baer at the Harvard Science Center

Harvard Book Store, the Harvard University Division of Science, the Harvard Library, and the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology welcome Neal Baer, MD, MA, MEd—award-winning showrunner, executive producer for the shows Designated Survivor, Baking Impossible, Under the Dome, and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, and the co-director of the master’s degree program in Media, Medicine, and Health at Harvard Medical School—for a discussion of her his book The Promise and Peril of CRISPR, a timely collection of essays on the pressing possibilities and risks of gene-editing technology. He will be joined in conversation by Rebecca Weintraub Brendel, MD, JD—Director of the Harvard Medical School Center for Bioethics and director of Law and Ethics at the Center for Law, Brain, and Behavior at Massachusetts General Hospital. This event will take place at the Harvard Science Center Hall B, located at 1 Oxford St, Cambridge.

There are two ticket options available for this event. Following the presentation will be a reception and book signing in the Cabot Science Library across the hall from the presentation room.

Free General Admission Ticket: Includes admission for one.

Book-Included Ticket: Includes admission for one and one paperback copy of The Promise and Peril of CRISPR.

Scientists and genetic engineers are becoming increasingly adept at editing the human genome. How far can—and should—they go in editing future generations? In The Promise and Peril of CRISPR, editor Neal Baer brings together a timely collection of essays by influential bioethicists, philosophers, and geneticists to explore the moral, ethical, and policy challenges posed by CRISPR technology.

We are at a technological and ethical crossroads in grappling with the impacts of genetic editing. Gene-editing technology holds the promise of curing more than 7,000 known genetic diseases. Yet with that promise comes the peril of using CRISPR to edit the human genome, which could not only lead to manipulating human evolution, but also to creating and releasing pathogens capable of wreaking havoc on human, animal, and plant life. Although CRISPR has already cured several genetic diseases, it could also be used to design biological weapons or to edit the embryos of people who can afford to purchase genetic "enhancements" for their children.

What role can and should the public play in discussing the far-reaching implications of gene editing? What oversights should be put in place to prevent a rogue scientist from engineering another baby – as was recently done with twins in China?

Essay contributors offer informed predictions and guidelines for how the uses of CRISPR today will affect life in the future. Decisions we make now may have unpredictable consequences for future generations. For anyone concerned about the uses and potential abuses of gene editing, these essays provide a critical and comprehensive discussion of the central issues surrounding CRISPR technology.

Contributors: Florence Ashley, R. Alta Charo, Marcy Darnovsky, Kevin Doxzen, Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, Gigi Kwik Gronvall, Jodi Halpern, Katie Hasson, Andrew C. Heinrich, Jacqueline Humphries, J. Benjamin Hurlbut, Ellen D. Jorgensen, Peter F. R. Mills, Carol Padden, Marcus Schultz-Bergin, Robert Sparrow, Sandra Sufian, Krystal Tsosie, Ethan Weiss, Rachel M. West

Neal Baer, MD, MA, MEd is an award-winning showrunner, television writer/producer, physician, author, lecturer on global health and social medicine, and the co-director of the master’s degree program in Media, Medicine, and Health at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Baer most recently was Executive Producer and Showrunner for the third season of Designated Survivor. Previously, he was Executive Producer and Showrunner for the hit CBS television series Under The Dome, the CBS medical drama A Gifted Man, as well as the Executive Producer of the hit NBC television series Law & Order: Special Victims Unit from 2000-2011. During his tenure on SVU, among the awards the series won include the Shine Award, People’s Choice Award, the Prism Award, Edgar Award, Sentinel for Health Award, and the Media Access Award. Prior to his work on SVU, Dr. Baer was Executive Producer of the NBC series ER. A member of the show’s original staff and a writer and producer on the series for seven seasons, he was nominated for five Emmys as a producer. He also received Emmy nominations for Outstanding Writing in A Drama Series for the episodes Hell and High Water and Whose Appy Now?. For the latter, he also received a Writers' Guild of America nomination. Among the multiple awards the series garnered include the People’s Choice Award, the Peabody Award, and an Emmy for best drama series. Dr. Baer’s other television work includes Warriors, an episode of China Beach, nominated for a Writers' Guild Award for best episodic drama, and the ABC Afterschool Special Private Affairs, which he wrote and directed. The Association of Women in Film and Television selected the program, dealing with sexually transmitted diseases, as the Best Children’s Drama of the Year. He wrote The Doctor Corps, a feature film for Twentieth Century Fox; Outreach, a pilot for the WB Network, which he also produced; The Edge, a medical series pilot for CBS; and The Beast, a medical series pilot for NBC, which was redeveloped in 2017 by Twentieth Century Fox Television. Dr. Baer’s first novel, K*ll Switch, co-written with Jonathan Greene, was published in January 2012, and his second novel, K*ll Again, also with Jonathan Greene, was published in 2015. In January 2020, Dr. Baer attended the Sundance Film Festival, where the film he executive produced, Welcome to Chechnya, won a Special Jury Award. The film was screened at the Berlin Film Festival and won the Teddy Award for outstanding film on LGBTQ issues. The documentary premiered on HBO in June 2020 and won the Peabody Award.

Rebecca Weintraub Brendel, MD, JD is the Director of the Center for Bioethics at Harvard Medical School. She bases her clinical work in psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) where she is the director of Law and Ethics at the Center for Law, Brain, and Behavior, provides medical oversight for the hospital’s inpatient guardianship team, and practices clinical and forensic psychiatry. Dr. Brendel has served in multiple roles at MGH over the past decade including as medical director of the One Fund Center for Boston Marathon bombing survivors, a psychiatrist on the Law & Psychiatry and Consultation Psychiatry Services, as clinical director of the Red Sox Foundation/ MGH Home Base Program for post 9/11 service members and their families, and as associate director of the MGH-based Harvard Forensic Psychiatry Fellowship. Dr. Brendel is an Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School.

Masks are encouraged but not required for this event.

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