Media: Mixed media on paper
110x 102 x 2.4 cm (W x H x D)
43.6 x 40 x 1 inch
Date: 2024
Price:
£2,000.00 collection from studio
Mixed media on paper mounted on board with wood supports. 2025
BIO TECH GONE WRONG
This painting imagines in an extreme visual form, what would happen if we began experimenting with genetic engineering between animals and humans and the experimentation went wrong by infecting living kind in unpredictable ways. I’ve used paint that drips uncontrollably, weird cartoon grins and hybrid creatures that seem to be agonised by their condition. The spiral forms on the left and right symbolise the shape of DNA. Nothing in the painting is restful, this intentionally reflects the theme of a global genetic melt-down.
This might seem like some scenario from a playstation or xbox game; but those involved in the ethical considerations of bio tech are highlighting that it is an area which is a big unknown for the future.
Plastics, back in the 50’s seemed like a wonder product that was part of a brave new world after the 2nd World War. Perhaps we should take note, and boring as it is conduct a more open risk assessment, not just for ourselves but for others.
AI seems to have taken us all by surprise at the suddenness of it’s arrival. Yet the development of AI has been years in the making. It’s the same scenario with biological research; As a field of enquiry, it has been advancing in lots of directions at pace. A quick internet search for ‘bio tech advances’ will reveal a plethora of interconnected applications both for now and the not so distant future. So, it’s far from trivial to assess the risk that AI and biological research might converge and produce results that are not in the best interests of livingkind.
As someone who loves creation in all its wonder and mystery. For the sake of the next generations; what do we want as a society from bio tech or genetic engineering or pathogen research for example? This should be for us to debate in an honest and open minded discussion as a culture and society. It is not something that we should leave to others better ‘qualified’ to make the decision on our behalf.
For anyone interested I’ve left some interesting mainstream web site pages that are just the tip of the iceberg revealing what is happening across the world in the area of bio tech research.
Anthony Richard Martin 03/01/2025
God Bless Us All
Times of India
“Grave threat to life on earth due to lab-made ‘mirror-image’ bacteria: All you want to know”
https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/other/grave-threat-to-life-on-earth-due-to-lab-made-mirror-image-bacteria-all-you-want-to-know/ar-AA1vPF9HStanford University -
Stanford explainer: “CRISPR, gene editing, and beyond”
https://news.stanford.edu/stories/2024/06/stanford-explainer-crispr-gene-editing-and-beyond
Newsweek. “Gain of function and why it is controversial”
Published Jul 22, 2021 at 3:20 PM EDT By Jenni Fink
https://www.newsweek.com/what-gain-function-research-why-it-controversial-1612323
BMJ (British Medical Journal) “The covid-19 lab leak hypothesis: did the media fall victim to a misinformation campaign?”
https://www.bmj.com/content/374/bmj.n1656
“Growing number of high-security pathogen labs around the world raises concerns” Science.org
https://www.science.org/content/article/growing-number-high-security-pathogen-labs-around-world-raises-concerns
Global medical ethics Paper
“3D bioprint me: a socioethical view of bioprinting human organs and tissues”
Niki Vermeulen1, Gill Haddow1, Tirion Seymour1, Alan Faulkner-Jones2, Wenmiao Shu2
1. Correspondence to Dr Niki Vermeulen, Department of Science, Technology and Innovation Studies, University of Edinburgh, Old Surgeons' Hall, High School Yards, Edinburgh EH1 1LZ, UK; niki.vermeulen@ed.ac.uk
Author: Niki Vermeulen,Gill Haddow,Tirion Seymour,Alan Faulkner-Jones,Wenmiao Shu
Publication: Journal of Medical Ethics
Publisher: BMJ Publishing Group Ltd.
Date: Sep 1, 2017
Copyright © 2017, The Author(s). Published by BMJ Publishing Group Ltd. Creative
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons CC BY 4.0 license, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
https://jme.bmj.com/content/43/9/618
“AI: How 'freaked out' should we be?”
By Anthony Zurcher 23 March 2023 writing for the BBC News
AI: How 'freaked out' should we be? - BBC News
Robot with human brain tissue learns how to use arms – The Independent
Story by Anthony Cuthbertson
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/robot-with-human-brain-tissue-learns-how-to-use-arms/ar-BB1pe581 edit it.
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