Reflection: Deaf By Design

I had done a project on gene ethics in Philosophy last year and I had been aware of our advancement in choosing what we want in our children but it wasn't until this presentation that I realized another side of our world.  I never thought that people would choose to want a deaf child so badly, I suppose it's because society teaches us that hearing children are "healthy" and "normal".  Nonetheless, during the discussions, I realized that it's just another language: we communicate with our voice while they communicate with sign language.

Mr. Chung spoke of scenarios where if everyone suddenly couldn't hear one day, those who were deaf by design would live longer than the rest of us because they would be more fit than us to survive.  I agree that under those circumstances it would be good to have a child who knew how to sign.  However, that's the environment that we presently live in.  Our world is full of if's and's and but's, and that may happen but presently, majority of the world communicates by talking to each other. If I had a child who was born deaf, I would probably have them get a Cochler implant.  As the mother in the video said, you have to give your child what's best for them.  And in today's society right now, the ability to hear is what is best.

Review: Grade 11 Genetics

Each person is made up of different traits.  Some people have brown eyes while some have green.  Some people may have blonde hair while others may not.  A child's traits are determined through their parent's genetic makeup.

Alleles are different forms of the same gene or trait.  For the trait of eye colour, there are green eyes, blue eyes, hazel eyes, and brown eyes; all these colours have their own allele.  However, certain traits are dominant over other traits.  For example, brown eyes are dominant to blue eyes.  Therefore, to have brown eyes, an individual would only need one allele for it; whereas with blue eyes, the individual must have both alleles.

We can find the possibly genotype (combination of alleles) and phenotype (physical traits) by using the Punnett Square.  With Gregor Mendel's technique of the Punnett Square, we can find the possible characteristics of two individuals' offspring.

Here are two other forms of inheritance:

Incomplete dominance - A third phenotype is created with one allele affects the second allele.  For example, a  father with straight hair and a mother with curly hair have a daughter with wavy hair.

Codominance - Both phenotypes are expressed when two alleles are equally dominant.  For example, a black cat and a tan cat would make a kitten with black fur and tan fur.