Good And Bad Behind The Use Of Technology In The Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks And Silent Springs

Throughout the years, scientist have discovered many outstanding findings or work with the help of technology. As in De-Extinction by, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot, and Silent Springs by Rachel Carson, all share the same idea. All of these show the good and bad behind the use of technology.

Some people believe that bringing back extinct animals is beneficial for the ecosystem and others believe that it’s not, but there’s always positive and negative side effect. In De-Extinction: The Science and Ethics of Bringing Lost Species Back to Life by Rebecca Hirsch, the first beneficial reason to it, is that it helps repair the environment, preserve biodiversity, and it could balance the human population. For instance, resurrecting animals could be the next big thing and it could advance science. On the other hand, de-extinction could bring dangerous consequences to mother nature. Also, the down side of this is that “many extinct creatures were fearsome killers that would be very dangerous to humans.” ( ). Which concludes that we could potentially be a threat to those animals, or that humans could go extinct.

In the Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot, the women behind the HeLa cells was Henrietta Lacks whose cancer cells helped many scientists advanced in medicine and “…helped develop drugs for treating herpes, leukemia, influenza…” (Skloot). Scientists even took her cells up to outer space to understand what would happen to it in zero gravity. Many doctors and scientist are still using her cells till this day to get more information. But things didn’t settle down very well for the Lacks family. They all had a hard time coping with their mother’s death who passed away at the age of 31 years old and Henrietta never gave her consent for the doctors to use her cells in the labs. Yet people have taken her cells and made money off of it without giving the family recognition. Furthermore in Silent Spring by Rachel Carson, she

Throughout the years, scientist have discovered many outstanding findings or work with the help of technology. As in De-Extinction by, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot, and Silent Springs by Rachel Carson, all share the same idea. All of these show the good and bad behind the use of technology.

Some people believe that bringing back extinct animals is beneficial for the ecosystem and others believe that it’s not, but there’s always a positive and negative side effect. In De-Extinction: The Science and Ethics of Bringing Lost Species Back to Life by Rebecca Hirsch, the first beneficial reason to it, is that it helps repair the environment, preserve biodiversity, and it could balance the human population. For instance, resurrecting animals could be the next big thing and it could advance science. On the other hand, de-extinction could bring dangerous consequences to mother nature. Also the down side of this is that “many extinct creatures were fearsome killers that would be very dangerous to humans.” ( ). Which concludes that we could potentially be a threat to those animals, or that humans could go extinct.

In the Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot, the woman behind the HeLa cells was Henrietta Lacks whose cancer cells helped many scientists advanced in medicine and “…helped develop drugs for treating herpes, leukemia, influenza…” (Skloot). Scientist even took her cells up to outer space to understand what would happen to it in zero gravity. Many doctors and scientist are still using her cells till this day to get more information. But things didn’t settle down very well for the Lacks family. They all had a hard time coping with their mother’s death who passed away at the age of 31 years old and Henrietta never gave her consent for the doctors to use her cells in the labs. Yet people have taken her cells and made money off of it without giving the family recognition.

Furthermore, in Silent Spring by Rachel Carson, she brings up both the ups and downs of pesticides which are being used in an agricultural organizations which in some case, can be very harmful or dangerous to the environment. While on the good side, pesticides keep animals from eating their crops or plantation. It also prevents diseases spreading from rodents like rats and mice. But, many of the farm animals will start dying off and eventually children and adults. Crops will no longer be available and the roadside will be completely destroyed. As a result, soon everything will start dying off and “this imagined tragedy may easily become a stark reality we all shall know.” (Carson).

Overall, the use of technology could benefit us in both ways and can also have consequences. Scientists, doctors, and researchers will go above and beyond to get the result that they wanted, but that isn’t always the case. They are taking every step to the next level, but in the end, will they be able to take full responsibility for their action or destruction that was created?