This oft-cited remark from Paul Ramsey's book, Fabricated Man, published over twenty years ago, puts theology in the position of interrogator of genetic science rather than conversation partner. He was one of the first ethicists to enter the debate over genetics. Nonetheless, the quotation needs to be set in the context of his argument as a whole, namely that theologians were placid in the face of overreaching claims of biologists, whose goal seemed to Ramsey to take the form of an unregulated religious fanaticism, beyond even the more modest hopes of humanism. The theologians he criticised were not just ‘techno-theologians’, but Roman Catholics such as Karl Rahner, who, he suggests, ‘clings to the belief that men are wise enough to invent themselves’ (p. 140). For Ramsey, the critical issue is not so much the future of religion, but the future of humanism. Hence, ‘It is not Christianity alone but man as well that the revolutionary biologists have left behind in their flights of grasping after godhead’ (p. 146). Moreover, for him, human dignity is not just ensuring that those who come after us are better than we are.

This seems very far from the way the term ‘playing God’ has come to be used, according to Ted Peters: ‘The acerbic rhetoric that usually employs the phrase “playing God” is aimed at inhibiting if not shutting down certain forms of scientific research and medical therapy.’