What Was Synthetic Biology?

2014

The desire to make life is not new. Mythology and history provide numerous examples of this Promethean longing. Materialist and evolutionist scientists over a century ago were convinced of the possibility and even the need to synthesize living beings to advance the knowledge on the nature and origin of life. The premature synthetic biology attempts by Stephane Leduc and Alfonso L. Herrera reflected the mechanistic ideal in biology of Jacques Loeb. The book “La biologie synthetique” by Leduc (1912) clearly defines the efforts of these pioneers: “Why is it less acceptable to seek how to make a cell than how to make a molecule?” Journalists have presented many advances in biology in the past c…