Better Babies/Higher Humans is a ‘Parafictional’ narrative that combines visual language and digital interactivity to expose gene editing technology as a controversial tool for designing human beings in the near future. Which limits can be defined between curing hereditary diseases and enhancing traits that are subject to personal preferences?
__________________________
The project is composed of:
- A body of academic research that poses current biotech communication practices against historic eugenics rhetoric.
- The creation of a fictional biotech corporation, HHGI (Higher Humans Genetics Institute), and a customer journey (see below).
- A desktop that allows the selection and customisation of a Better Baby, suggested using the user's own genetic traits as input.
1. Desktop app: Design your Baby
The project raises warnings regarding how gene editing, as a market-based asset, might ratify a price valuation practice towards an individual’s genetic code. This could also affect the way parents build their families and decide ‘what is best’ for their descendants. These ideas are embodied within the aim of this project, which is to expose a new form of eugenic language as a potential tool to promote the commercialisation of upcoming gene editing technologies in a dystopian future.
To reinforce the overall concept, a genetic algorithm was applied to specific elements of the visual language, such as typography and a baby icon. Genetic Algorithm is a form of 'primitive' AI, in which the program runs until it finds a results that matches the user's initial input.
2. Fictional biotech corporation: HHGI
