Skip navigation Jump to main navigation

Applications for 2024 Columbia Summer Session programs are now open!

Close alert

Genetics In Court Is a Very Messy Business

Although recent court cases blamed the defendants' genetics for their bad behavior, Bioethics professor Dr. Paul Applebaum wrote in an essay for Neuron that such a defense misconstrues genetics and has negative implications for the American legal system. 

Time quotes from his essay: "The ‘my genes made me do it’ argument is problematic because there is no evidence that genes make a person behave in a certain way that is beyond their capacity to control or recognize is wrong."