Abstract

Is genetic information of special ethical significance? Does it require special regulation? There is considerable contemporary debate about this question. Genetic information is an ambiguous term and, as an aid to avoiding conflation in the genetic exceptionalism debate, a detailed account is given of just how and why genetic information is ambiguous. Whilst ambiguity is a ubiquitous problem of communication, it is suggested that genetic information is ambiguous in a particular way, one that gives rise to the problem of significance creep. A contextual and contrastive methodology is proposed: evaluating the significance of genetic information requires us to be sensitive to the polysemy of genetic information across contexts and then examine the contrast in significance of genetic, as opposed to nongenetic, information within contexts. This, in turn, suggests that a proper solution to the regulatory question requires us to pay more attention to how and why information, and its acquisition, possession and use, come to be of ethical significance.