conVerge - Bioeconomics

Bioeconomics - Ionat Zurr

I'm going to give the presentation that can be divided into three short ones.

I'll start with reading a future scenario that we wrote in regard to the Pig Wings just to ignite the imagination a bit. Then I'm going to talk about some issues in Xeno transplantation before finishing with our Pig Wings as semi living objects - objects that we need to care for.

So I'll start with the future scenario.

'It was her 16th birthday and she knew that from today she would finally be able to get a legal implant. Most of her friends had one already. She had been planning that for a while. A few months ago she went to the implants farm and checked the catalogue in the display. She knew immediately what she wanted. A pair of the quality wings. Just like the ones on the hamster bear she got for Christmas when she was ten. The farm practitioner took a biopsy from her inner thigh and then showed the scaffold design. 'Would I fly', she asked. He laughed, 'Oh no that would require a complete redesign of your body. And then you'll only be able to glide. These wings are designed to go with the current fashion of backless dresses.' 'What about these feather wings?' she inquired. 'I don't think your parents have the budget', he replied, 'and besides they will not grow with you. They are for adults only'. It was a regular procedure and the risk of contamination was reduced to less than 3%. The farmer took her behind the office to the implants growth factory. She looked through the glass window where pigs with different body parts seamlessly attached to them were laying in pools of clear liquid. He showed her to her pig. She immediately liked her pig. It was smooth and it's skin colour was just like hers. The farmer explained that the pig carried human genes to increase compatibility. She trusted the pig to carry and grow her wings until they would be grafted back to her.

OK - Xeno Transplantation. As you all probably know it's the transplantation of cells and tissue or organs from non-humans to humans. This procedure crosses the species barrier that has evolved over millions of years of evolution.

Why pigs? Well size matters - their organs are more or less the size of our organs - similarities in morphology. They are easy to handle and unlike primates the idea of harvesting organs from pigs is more natural, after all we eat pigs. You probably all heard about the Knock Out Pigs and you have probably heard about human genes inserted into pigs for better transplant compatibility. Dr (audio!) was one of the leading scientists in Xeno Transplantation in Harvard Medical School for many years. In 1998 he declared a moratorium on his work and published a very interesting commentary in Nature Medicine titled 'Uncertainty in Xeno Transplantation in Future Benefits Versus Collective Risk'. In it he states that our current knowledge and ability to access future risk in regard to Xeno Transplantation is extremely limited while the technology is rushing forward. He maintains that it is time to stop the technological development and have a cross community debate to access those risks and then if considered appropriate, research can resume within the agreed framework.

I'll detail some of the risks. When there is a transplantation of an organ from a non-human into a human, there is a need to reduce the immune level of the recipient as well as the donor. That actually enables retroviruses to develop. Every species lives with their own viruses in symbiosis but sometimes the transfer of those viruses to a new species can create retroviruses and that can create unrecognised syndromes both in the human or pig populations. The risk of this is infection and transfer to a third party with the potential to wipe an entire whole population. Perhaps - no more pork.

However there are alternatives to Xeno Transplantation - tissue engineering and stem cell research. It might not be as cheap and accessible as pig farms and they have their own problems of course. Our idea is to propose alternatives for those technologies in order to start a dialogue, a debate and to suggest future scenarios. Technological progress is not linear, we have to do a lot to get to where we want to be. Lets look at tissue technologies - firstly, cosmetics, physical enhancement, body modification, all those things that have been practiced by humans for a long time. Second, is what I call 'support of destructive habits'. Lets say that I like to drink - a liver replacement will help me to continue this habit. Companies will actively seek to grow and market their livers. Thirdly, is the semi- living object. I look at them as evocative objects because they are objects that blur the boundaries between what we perceive as living, non-living, object, subject, body, environment. They make us feel uneasy and unsure of what to make of them, raising a whole range of philosophical and ethical questions. Importantly, with these objects, we have to care for them - even here with the Pig Wings Exhibition, Oron has to feed the cells daily and make sure they are in the right condition. The relationship of an artist taking care of a living creation as well as the audience relationship to the living sculpture is really important.

Finally, all these issues are going to be addressed at a conference Oron will be organising in August called 'The Aesthetic of Care' and I urge you to present a paper there.