Case 22/2017:
Salk Institute for Biological Studies & Jun Wu
ETHICAL JUDGMENT
Dear Prosecutor, Public Defender,
Ambassador and Jury Members of the International
Buddhist Ethics Committee (IBEC) & Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights (BTHR),
regarding the case against Salk
Institute for Biological Studies and the scientist Jun Wu, through this document, on April 3rd 2017, it is recorded
that the Case 22-2017 of the Buddhist Tribunal has been concluded in order to
analyze the violation of human rights by the accused ones. This case has been
carried out as a result of a complaint made by the Maitriyana Buddhist University against immoral experiments.
After analyzing the presentation of
the case and the validation of the enormous amount of evidence, it took place a
unanimous vote by 5 members of the Jury, all of whom have sentenced the Salk Institute for Biological Studies
and the scientist Jun Wu as "Responsible" for the serious
charges of CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY and VIOLATION OF ANIMAL RIGHTS.
The actions of the Salk Institute for
Biological Studies and the scientist Jun
Wu in creating a human-pig hybrid have produced enormous damage to the
Genetic Heritage of Humankind, but also an enormous damage to the rights of
animals that are non-human subjects.
These terrible facts demonstrate that members of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies have broken both the human
rights treaties as well as the ethical precepts of Buddhist Spirituality as
guardian of all sentient beings.
Even though the Salk Institute for Biological Studies and
the scientist Jun Wu have publicly
stated that their creation of hybrids seeks an alleged aim of public welfare,
which is the massive production of organs intended for transplants, science
cannot violate the limits of Ethics, the Law and Human Rights. The consequences
of this kind of transgressions on the part of science have produced disasters
in the history of humanity as, for example, the creation of the atomic bombs
used in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This is because when science is not guided by
ethics, humanitarianism and compassionate wisdom (karuna-prajna), as happens
with the creation of biological weapons, catastrophes occur that jeopardize the
very existence of humanity and of Mother Earth. Because in biotechnology the
knowledge is technical, most of these experts are absolutely unaware of the ethical
and humanitarian limits, so they promote their researches towards technical
applications and never towards the welfare and peace of humankind. The Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights seeks
to ensure that science follows the highest standards, promoting knowledge but
permanently being directed toward the safeguard of human dignity and the
fundamental rights. In this way, scientific knowledge must be used with special
responsibilities, seeking to meet the higher needs and aspirations of the human
being, such as peace, justice, wisdom and compassion. Science has the ethical
duty to contribute to social welfare and sustainable development, protecting
present and future generations always in harmony with nature and always
avoiding serious and irreversible risks. The biotechnological use of the human
genetic heritage has a global and transgenerational effect, so it should always
be guided by ethics. Buddhist Law's effective response to scientific
interventions that manipulate human genome is the prohibition and condemnation
of such actions, showing them as internationally illegal. In this sense, the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights
protects the political, economic, cultural and environmental rights,
guaranteeing supreme respect for peace and intergenerational development,
including the protection of human rights to genetic identity, to individual and
collective genetic integrity, to imperfection, to genetic diversity and to
variability. Buddhist Law has the capability to issue juridical provisions,
jurisprudential decisions and international legal principles that are
applicable to actions of scientific research and technological development,
especially if they affect health and the physical, mental and moral integrity
of the people, in order that science is exercised with responsibility and
preserving dignity. In this context, the Buddhist
Tribunal on Human Rights regulates the development of genetic science and
its effect on sentient beings, providing protection and legal security to
humankind facing the unrestrained advances of genetic science. The Buddhist Law
recognizes as a passive subject to
any juridical person in which the scientific genetic actions fall, so that at
the public and supraindividual level the subject is the whole humanity while at
individual or particular level the subject may be cells, germinal lines,
zygotes, embryos, tissues, organs, babies, adults and even corpses. For this
reason, the Buddhist Tribunal on Human
Rights not only protects sentient beings from the moment of its very
fertilization, but also through analysis and bioethical condemnation it even
protects future entities such as the genetic heritage of future generations. Thus,
Buddhist Law considers the genetic manipulation in the germinal line during the
embryonic development as a crime, seeking to avoid the manipulation of the
human genetic identity, which is the alteration of the natural development of
genes. Although there are supposed therapeutic purposes, the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights
coincides with Genetic Law in the fact that this manipulation would be a crime
that must be criminally punished. Therefore, the offense of germ line genetic
manipulation would include genetic therapy, eugenics, clonation and genetic
engineering of human-animal hybrids, especially when the created embryo is
discarded by systematic abortion, rather than treat it with the respect that
human dignity implies. The defense of the human right to the integrity of the
genetic patrimony implies the ethical condemnation to the genetic manipulation,
even if it can get to look for optimum,
healthy or evolved human beings. In this sense, with genetic manipulation,
there is a limit that science should never trespass, since otherwise humanity
would become a mere means or instrument in a new modality of racism and even
slavery. On the other hand, the defense of the human right to genetic integrity
implies the protection of the biochemical dimension and also the protection of
the natural habitat where the genome is developed. Thus, if the human genetic
patrimony is implanted in the body of an animal in order to create human
organs, the conversion of the genetic code into proteins would have been
carried out in a non-natural or non-human habitat, which entails the risk of
altering the genetic structure of these human organs.
Concordantly, when science conducts
hybrid experiments, such as creating mice with human brains, there is no ethics
or humanitarianism in this kind of actions, but a propensity for stupidity and
disproportion, since human genetic heritage and integrity of animals is
violated for the sole purpose of producing consumer goods, as if life were but
an instrument. This type of perspective has led the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights to affirm, within the framework
of Case 08-2015 Australia, that Capitalism is a Crime against humanity, precisely because it turns the human being
into a mere instrument or object. Buddhist Law then considers that a possible
example of an ethical purpose in the creation of hybrids is not the production
of organs for transplants, but it could be the fact of trying to produce a
consciousness evolution of animals, but even this type of apparently benevolent
goals should be carried out through appropriate means and not by spurious
means, because the genetic humanization
of animals - by incorporating human genetic material - perverts the dignity
and sacred potentialities of human life. In this way, an appropriate means of
animal evolution developed by science could be not to resort to the
incorporation of genetic material but rather to develop the animal brain by
strengthening new synapses or connections between neurons that are vital for
conscious thought. However, the Buddhist
Tribunal on Human Rights states that the evolution of animal life and human
life does not actually occur through genetic or physical changes, but rather
through cultural changes. This means that the Liberation or Awakening, as a
true evolution of life, does not happen through a change in the brain, but
rather occurs through the full development of the potentialities of liberty,
equality and fraternity, which are values that can be found and deepened in
animal life without the need to resort to genetic experiments. In effect, the
potentialities for love, friendship and solidarity, even for knowledge, are
also present in animals, especially in advanced mammals, as demonstrated in the
Universal
Declaration on the Rights of Non-Human Beings. Even Buddhism has the
particularity of having recognized in the Dasabodhisattuppattikatha
text that the last two Sammasambuddhas of the future - Buddha Tissa and Buddha
Sumangala - will come from the spiritual evolution of two elephants. This means that there is
an explicit recognition to the fact that the dharmic nature or intrinsic dignity is not only found in human
beings but also in all living beings, especially in large mammals such as
elephants, hominids, cetaceans and pigs.
The perversion of scientific and
humanitarian ethics by the Salk
Institute for Biological Studies and the scientist Jun Wu violates the right to life and to non-genetic manipulation
of animals. This violation of fundamental rights is completely unnecessary, since
the supposed aim of these pseudo-scientists, which is the capitalistic
production of transplant organs, can be perfectly achieved by means of other
contemporary technologies such as 3D
bioprinters, which have already demonstrated the capability of imprinting
human organs and living tissues, as has been investigated by the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative
Medicine (WFIRM). Here the Buddhist
Tribunal on Human Rights finds an example of science and biotechnology that
would not violate humanity's genetic heritage by not resorting to the creation
of human-animal hybrids.
That said, the question to be
debated would be what ethical position should be adopted in the case of
human-animal hybrids that had already been created or born. The Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights believes
that the Catholic Church's view that these beings would be monsters would actually lead to disaster, as it would be an
endorsement to their possible assassination. A hybrid should not be treated
differently from the rights of children or disabled people. Furthermore, the
true monsters of the world are
immoral scientists and pedophile priests. Therefore, the Buddhist Law
establishes that hybrid experimentation should be prohibited, although in case
they had already been created and born, these beings should not be treated as
objects of consumption but they should fully receive fundamental freedoms and
human rights because, given the fact that they are descendants of humankind, inside them inhabits the intrinsic dignity
of the human genetic heritage. In this sense, it is evident that the most
terrible crime of the Salk Institute for
Biological Studies and the scientist Jun
Wu is not the creation of hybrids but rather dispossessing these sentient
beings from their fundamental rights and intrinsic dignity. Precisely, in
deciding that these hybrid beings would not deserve the rank of people, the Salk Institute for Biological Studies and the scientist Jun Wu have violated the human dignity,
considering humanity as a mere means
in a utilitarian way. This racist exclusion from the rank of person against a hybrid being has a
perverse background in history, since in the past, disabled people, aborigines,
African-American, and Jewish were also excluded from the rank of person. The
great danger of creating human-animal hybrids is that it will probably unleash
the creation of a new human species devoid of human rights, which could become
enslaved or used as a mere object. As happened in the past with indigenous
peoples, African Americans and Jews, having a large set of enslave human beings
seems to be the dream of capitalism, which has always considered workers as a
mere instrument of economic gain and never as an end in itself. This kind of
creation of human-animal hybrids would surely be a way in which capitalism
would secure free labor, creating and exploiting intelligent beings with no
human rights, ceasing to consider human dignity as an end in itself, in order
to pervert it by treating it as a mere object or means. The human being cannot
be considered as a thing, but it always deserves respect for the free
development of its potentialities. The creation of human-animal hybrids,
together with discrimination and genetic determinism and with reproductive, therapeutic and hybrid cloning,
constitute an instrumentalization of the human being that violates ethical and
juridical guidelines at the international level. Coinciding with Kant, the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights
affirms that human beings are not a means but are ends in themselves, because
they possess an intrinsic and ontological dignity that is common to all the
descendants of the human family, regardless of their level of
self-determination, rationality, self-perception, ethical behavior, gender,
race, economic capacity, ideology, genetic material or vital cycle. Thus, even
if human-animal hybrids were created without any advanced brain, these beings
should have the same human rights as those of a baby, a child or a mentally
disabled person, especially considering that human being does not think only
with the brain but also with the gut. Buddhist Law considers that hybrid cloning of human-animals is
ethically unacceptable for violating respect for human dignity and the
protection of genetic integrity. But the Buddhist
Tribunal on Human Rights also states the need to prohibit other forms of
genetic manipulation, such as therapeutic
cloning in which a cloned embryo is used as a source of resources,
undermining the right to biological uniqueness of the human being and violating
the right to life by destroying cloned embryos. Certainly, hybrid cloning and therapeutic
cloning are perverse techniques that commercialize parts of the human body,
by instrumentalizing the human being to satisfy personal or utilitarian needs. The
clone created, whether human or hybrid, has the right to exist and the right to
genetic individuality, and must express its life without any interference that
may damage its integrity or originality in order to realize its vital project
and freely develop its personality, without being programmed by scientific
expectations or interests. Thus, multiple Declarations, Resolutions and
Conventions of International Law have denounced that these genetic engineering
procedures have serious ethical and legal problems, being human rights
violations that should not be justified or tolerated by society for
representing a serious violation of the dignity and fundamental freedoms. The
experiments carried out by the Salk
Institute for Biological Studies and the scientist Jun Wu are an offense against human rights for developing a science
that instrumentalizes the genetic heritage, undermining the intrinsic dignity
of humanity. The Buddhist Tribunal on
Human Rights is fighting for science to follow ethical norms and International
Law, since the direct guardianship of human rights is above any therapeutic,
scientific, industrial and commercial interest. This implies remembering the
fact that the human being exists as a subject of rights since its
fertilization, so that the embryo and the baby should receive respect and
non-instrumentalization of their intrinsic dignity. In short, contemporary
science is in a course that can decisively alter the future of humanity, since
genetic interventions in the germinal line have the genocidal ability to partially or totally destroy the human
species. Human rights safeguard and defend the guarantee of Liberation, which
is broadened with the respect, solidarity and responsibility, so that human
rights are universal, priority and non-negotiable. This means that human rights
are violated when there is no universal protection or respect for this
intrinsic Liberty of human life, which is what International Law and Buddhist
Law respectively refer to as human
dignity or dharmic nature.
After establishing that the
creation of human-animal hybrids constitutes a violation of human dignity, it
is certainly very easy to understand that this act constitutes a Crime
against Humanity, since International Law includes inhuman treatment that seriously undermines human dignity as one of
the forms of crimes against humanity, as long as they are part of a systematic or generalized plan. In the
case of the Salk Institute for
Biological Studies and the scientist Jun
Wu, they have systematically planned their crimes against human dignity for
more than a decade, and even have explicit plans for their results and
procedures to have generalized characteristics
in the future. In addition, these inhumane acts of hybrids creation can also be
interpreted as a form of medical torture,
which is also a crime against humanity,
causing serious suffering to the hybrid subject while seriously infringes upon
the physical integrity of the genetic human heritage. The Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights agrees with UNESCO on the fact
that human genetic heritage must be protected as part of the respect for human
dignity and fundamental rights, so that technologies must never compromise the
sacredness of the human species and the very life. The Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights agrees with UNESCO on the issue
that researches with the human genome must respect and be compatible with
International Human Rights Law, having the duty to prohibit and condemn
scientific practices contrary to human dignity and fundamental freedoms such as
the hybrid cloning or therapeutic cloning. As embryos are
created for experimentation purposes and without the requirement of free and informed consent by the test
subject, these experiments of human-animal hybrids are prohibited by the
principles of the Nuremberg
International Tribunal, which also requires human experimentation is
justified by benefits that cannot be obtained by other means. As has been
shown, experiments by the Salk Institute
for Biological Studies and the scientist Jun Wu are capricious and
unnecessary, because 3D printer
technologies are another method that would provide a simpler and more
ethical way of mass production of transplantation organs without having to
create hybrids and then causing them
physical harm or death. Another principle of Nuremberg violated by the
creation of human-animal hybrids for transplants is that the degree of risk of
altering human genetic heritage far exceeds the supposed humanitarian
importance of the problem that this experiment aims to solve, since the number
of patients who need transplants by disease issues is a minor problem compared
to the hundreds of millions of people who die because of war, poverty,
ignorance and pollution. In addition, from the International Law's perspective,
such genetic experiments are inhuman acts
because they produce lesions, disfigurement and mutilation to the organs of the
hybrid subject. These biological experiments conducted by the Salk Institute for Biological Studies
and the scientist Jun Wu are a
contemporary form of inhuman treatment
and medical torture because they violate human dignity and integrity, being
a form of violence and an attack on life.
Such acts constitute an outrage against the supreme right to human dignity and
self-determination, producing living beings without fundamental rights who are
subjected to a treatment of contempt, humiliation, degradation and homicide. These
experiments instrumentalize human life, so that they are incompatible with the
fundamental rights and values of the legal and political order at the
international level. Both Buddhist Law and International Human Rights Law
oblige science to respect the integrity and dignity of human life. Therefore,
genetic experiments that can trigger the biological inferiority of the
participant subject are prohibited. The attack on human dignity is the final
barrier that science must never cross, and the ethical task of the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights is to
defend this intrinsic dignity or dharmic
nature in order it is never violated. In fact, like Ambedkar, the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights
considers that Justice is just another
name for Liberty, Equality and Fraternity, while at the same time it could
be established that the ethical principle underlying these three essential
values is the principle of Respect for the dignity and non-instrumentalization
of humankind. The precepts of Buddhist Law and International Law use this
concept of dignity in the sense of affirming that there is a nature that is
intrinsic to the condition of person which deserves to be respected. Thus,
although science has the right to genetic research, just like the right to
freedom of expression, this right is not absolute because it has ethical limits
that should never be violated, such as precautionary and prudential criteria,
in order to protect dignity and respect for human rights.
The creation of human-animal
hybrids initiates a meta-ethical debate in which the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights is positioned as a Constitutional Guardian of Humanity and
Mother Earth. Because it is an independent, plural and transparent ethics
committee, the Buddhist Tribunal on
Human Rights has the ability to supervise or disapprove scientific
experiments operating against the regulatory framework of International Human
Rights Law. In this regard, the Buddhist
Tribunal on Human Rights ruled that the Salk Institute for Biological Studies and the scientist Jun Wu are "Responsible" for committing crimes against humanity, as
their conduct has aggrieved the very nature of human being, affecting their
intrinsic dignity in carrying out serious violations of the international
obligation to safeguard individual and collective human dignity. The entire
international community has been aggrieved by these crimes committed by the Salk Institute for Biological Studies
and the scientist Jun Wu, who have
affected one of the most precious aspects of a human person: the integrity of
the genetic heritage. Indeed, these cruel and inhumane medical torture procedures have violated the physical, mental and
moral integrity of humankind, even though the accused ones may claim their
actions caused no pain. The Salk
Institute for Biological Studies and the scientist Jun Wu have violated human dignity because they have not oriented
their scientific research towards the principles of respect for the right to
life, respect for the right to recognition of legal identity and respect for
the right to the preservation of genetic integrity or oneness.
Undoubtedly, another possible
consequence of allowing such immoral and illegal experiments is that
manipulation of the human genetic heritage leads to eugenics, a Nazi scientific method that consists in preventing the
existence of individuals with unwanted genes or characteristics, seeking
genetic perfection in the spurious method of starting to design stronger and
more intelligent humans. Therefore, faced with a humanity seeking improvements
through artificial and technological means, the Buddhist Law establishes that
humanity must evolve through cultural and spiritual means, such as it has been
doing for thousands of years. Precisely, the spiritual masters teach that
evolution is not genetic but ethical. However, contemporary science
is oriented toward the dark horizon of evolution through technology, either
through genetic manipulation or through inserting machines within bodies. This
quest for improving natural human abilities is a lack of knowledge of all the
ethical and spiritual heritage of history, so that the Buddhist Law must fight
to prevent this evil, teaching humanity that the Path of Cure of suffering can
never be carried out by means of increasing the computerized rational
intelligence or by means of the acquisition of new bodily abilities product of
the incorporation of technologies that reprogram DNA. The human being, unlike
computers, has the potentialities of emotional intelligence, social
intelligence, ecological intelligence and spiritual intelligence, and this is
what must be developed in order to evolve. Genetic reprogramming technologies
that occur through inter-species hybridization processes or through the
incorporation of microscopic nanotechnology not only won't cure suffering of
humanity but will open up a further breach of social injustice, since surely;
rich and powerful elites are those who will access the most important
technologies, excluding all those who are poor and oppressed. In contrast to Transhumanism, a philosophy that
proposes human evolution through technology, the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights considers that artificial
intelligence may help human beings to develop and evolve only if science is
under the supervision of spiritual values and ethical principles, otherwise
humanity would involute into a species lacking the best legacy of life:
compassionate wisdom (karuna-prajña). In this sense, it should be noted that
the distance between the ordinary animal and the human being is the same
distance as between the ordinary human being and the Awakened Being (Buddha),
which means the Free and Enlightened Beings (Arhats-Bodhisattvas) are
precursors of a possible evolutionary future of humanity. This possible
evolutionary path of the superhuman or Homo
Spiritualis is purely natural and non-technological. For the Buddhist Law,
Transhumanism should not be materialistic and technological, but spiritual and
ethical, since materialism leads to barbarity and inhumanity. If humanity is
obsessed with a technological evolution without ethical and spiritual guidance,
then it will gradually lose fundamental aspects of human dignity, such as goodness,
love, humor, art, philosophy, literature, science, friendship and fatherhood.
Contrary to the contemporary scientific view that humanity evolves in a
desirable direction, the Buddhist Law must show that this path actually leads
to the self-destruction of humanity.
However, in view of the fact that
the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights
prohibits and declares the genetic manipulation of human-animal hybrids as
illegal, it should be made clear that this rule has only one exception. Faced
with a probable catastrophic event in which planet Earth would be driven to
inevitable destruction, humankind would have the collective right to survive in
other planets. Even so, in order to perform such a cosmic achievement, humanity
should obligatorily make a genetic modification that allows it to survive the
arduous environmental conditions of outer space or other planets. Undoubtedly a
human-artificial hybridization or a possible hybridization with living beings
such as the Tardigrade (also known as
waterbears or moss piglets) would provide hibernation capacities for hundreds
of years and also abilities to resist high levels of heat and cold, which is
necessary to survive both in space and in other planets. The exception to the
prohibition of genetic manipulation demonstrates that the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights is not morally dogmatic, since
this exception is the case of a modification of the collective genetic heritage
in order to respect the collective right to survival of species, and it should
only be applied facing an enormous need to respect the right to life of all
humankind. Clearly, the experiments of the Salk
Institute for Biological Studies and the scientist Jun Wu do not meet the requirement of necessity to be an exception
to the rule prohibiting genetic manipulation. This exception to the rule could
not be used to save an individual life, since collective rights could not be
violated in order to respect an individual right, nor should this exception be
applied to the creation of immortal human beings. Effectively, as the
philosopher Savater argues in his reading of Ernst Cassirer, the essential
aspect of human consciousness is the understanding of time and the fact that in
the future the subject is going to die, since understanding that there is death
precisely revalues life, because an eternal life would lack all value and
transcendence. This awareness of death and finitude is the engine of life
projects. But if science creates immortal human beings, as it is proposed to do
in the future, then it would create beings without any appreciation for life.
This demonstrates that the ideas of materialistic Transhumanism are dangerous, in addition of having been influenced
by the Futurism of Marinetti and the Eugenics of Galton, both movements with
ideas used by Fascism. Although the Buddhist Law shares with Transhumanism the premise that Homo
Sapiens is not the end of evolution but the beginning, and also shares the
issue that nonhuman beings (plants, animals, artificial intelligence, post
human and extraterrestrial beings) deserve fundamental rights, the Spirituality
undoubtedly is unable to endorse the dangerous idea of Transhumanism to seek immortality in a digital substrate, because
this search violates the three features of existence discovered by Gautama:
imperfection, impermanence and insubstantiality. These existential features are
inevitable and science should not try to repress them, but should imitate the
spiritual masters, who turn these inevitable features into a source of
compassionate wisdom (karuna-prajna) and peak knowledge (satori), because even
suffering is a source of spiritual maturity. Like Frankl, the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights
considers that the Stoic attitude towards inevitable suffering is the
culmination of existential maturity, overcoming suffering not through
technology but through a contemplative attitude that appreciates the
experiences of nature, the artistic experiences, the sense of humor,
experiences of the past, solitude and Spirituality. Contemporary science should
not seek perfection and immortality of the human being, but must learn from the
Free and Enlightened Beings (Arhats-Bodhisattvas), by positioning themselves
with the strength of serenity faced with the conflicts of what is unavoidable.
Unlike the philosopher Sloterdijk,
the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights
considers that a genetic-technical revision of human being should be
prohibited, since the utopia of justice should never be replaced with
technological fantasies that do nothing but only revive fascist racism and
totalitarianism of the twentieth century with their ambitions of eugenic
control. In opposition to the philosopher Sloterdijk, Buddhist Law considers
that a plan of domestication and breeding
of humanity should not be developed, even if this is in the name of order
and social purity, since the genetic production of a herd-consciousness human being does nothing but create impotent
uncultivated masses and omnipotent ruling elites. In this way, the science of
genetic manipulation can become the new face of fascism, which has always
dreamed with mass production of beautiful,
healthy and intelligent human beings. This technological and barbaric
Transhumanism will always have an opposite or nemesis: the Buddhist
Spirituality. In fact, the Buddhist
Tribunal on Human Rights works for a transhuman future but carried out by
ethical and non-technological means, since otherwise humanity would involute in
savagery. Thus, spiritual masters struggle against the dehumanization or
inhumanization proposed by the society of
entertainment, which, like the ancient Roman Coliseum, always aspires to
cruelty and massacre as a form of fascist entertainment.
In conclusion, Buddhist Law has the
Purpose (Dharma) to save all beings through the peak knowledge (satori), which
implies a direct criticism to the sciences that covetously attempt against
human dignity. Therefore, the Buddhist
Tribunal on Human Rights states that any institution or scientist
supporting or collaborating with the Salk Institute
for Biological Studies and the scientist Jun Wu will be complicit in human rights violations. Undoubtedly,
scientists should be working together in creating a better world, thinking of
saving humankind and nature, instead of making inventions that endanger their
existence. Without an ethical and spiritual guidance science becomes an impure
and destructive force, leading humanity through a Path of cultural perversion
whose consequences are nothing less than the possible destruction of life. Only
by practicing Appropriate Knowledge,
such as Master Gautama has prescribed in his alternative version of the Tenth Noble Path, science will be able
to avoid falling into perversion which is to undermine human dignity and the
fundamental rights of non-human beings. In this way, this Case on the Salk Institute for Biological Studies
and the scientist Jun Wu is a great
teaching for humanity, perfectly proving that if medical science works without
ethics - as happens with biological weapons, genetic manipulation, abortion and
euthanasia - then science becomes an evil in the world, just as materialism and
capitalism are. Instead, when science remains guided by the ethical and
humanitarian power of compassionate wisdom (karuna-prajna), it is free from all
destructive power, being capable of helping to liberate the human being by
means of the peak knowledge (satori).
Following the Path of Master
Gautama, who created the noblest science system in the history of humankind,
the Buddhist Tribunal on Human Rights
oversees that scientific disciplines do not perish and commit crimes violating
ethics, human rights, and dignity of life, so that the Salk Institute for Biological Studies and the scientist Jun Wu have been sentenced as "Responsible" for CRIMES
AGAINST HUMANITY and VIOLATION OF ANIMAL RIGHTS, constituting the
highest attack on genetic heritage of humanity in all its history.
With a spirit of reconciliation (maitri),
Master Maitreya Samyaksambuddha
President and Spiritual Judge of the International Buddhist Ethics Committee
(IBEC) & Buddhist Tribunal on
Human Rights (BTHR)
