Communicating with Congress

I was vaguely planning a post on the Bioethics Commission discussion on Synthetic Biology, but was frustrated by the fact that there aren’t any transcripts of the sessions yet.  Which means that the only way to find out if anything interesting happened is to listen to a whole day of talks.  Alas, I don’t have time for that — I’ll wait for the skimmable version to come out.  (Or perhaps someone else has already done the listening and could share some thoughts?  Looking at you, Silver lab).

But in looking for the Bioethics discussion I came across the Committee on Energy and Commerce’s Hearing on Developments in Synthetic Genomics and Implications for Health and Energy, which happened last May (triggered by the Venter Institute’s publication of the construction of a synthetic genome, nicknamed “Synthia”).  If you have a few minutes to browse the transcript, it’s actually quite interesting to see the careful ballet between the politicians and the scientists, both of whom are always aware that the press is listening and will pounce on any slip of the tongue.   Nevertheless, some kind of communication manages to happen.  Here, for example, is the Chairman, Henry Waxman, making absolutely certain that everyone understands that the leap from “Synthia” to Frankenstein’s monster is not a small one: