I’ve been following the outrage over A-Rod’s use of performance enhancing drugs, and I still don’t get it. They keep saying that the records are “tainted”, and this is not a true test of athletic prowess. There is this sense that The Babe didn’t need no stinkin’ drugs.

But time passes and technologies improve. Modern players had the benefit of vaccines and vitamins and a vastly better level of nutrition then players in the past. Are those advantages also considered to have “tainted” the records?

People are bigger and stronger than their grandparents and great-grandparents because of these improvements. If technology can add to your abilities why not use it? I’m a science fiction writer, and I can’t wait for the time when we use gene therapy to eradicate diseases, improve muscle function, postpone aging. I want new technologies to deal with near and far sightedness. What I wouldn’t give to be able to see without contacts or glasses.

Eventually what we think of as the human norm may be modified in ways we can only imagine so that we can live underwater, or on higher density planets. I guess I just don’t think that natural is a terribly meaningful concept. Probably why I’m not bothered by genetically engineered food. If modified rice rich in vitamin A can prevent childhood blindness, and if we can find a way to increase yields so fewer people starve I kinda think these are good things.