Beowulf Code

The Beowulf Life Sciences Code was a code of ethics for medical practitioners and genetic engineers.

It originated on the planet Beowulf in the Sigma Draconis System, which was renowned for its medical scientists, in the wake of the Final War, supplanting the ancient Hippocratic Oath of Earth.

Provisions[]

Practitioner-Patient Confidentiality[]

One of the provisions of the code was Practitioner-Patient Confidentiality, but this very clause also had stipulations on circumstances where confidentiality could be involuntarily violated or waived by one party without consent of the other. (HH8)

Genetic Modification[]

The Code specifically prohibited the modification of the human genome following the horrors of the Final War, though many existing pre-war modification packages that were designed to aid the colonization of planets with hostile environments were grandfathered into the Code^[1]. (CS4)

Cloning and Genetic Slavery[]

The Code stipulated that human clones were no different than any other human being in the eyes of the law with the same legal rights. Additionally, the Code specifically prohibited their indentureship on the basis that no clone could ask to be born and it was therefore immoral and illegal to compel them to repay a debt they never chose to assume. (CS4)

Dissent[]

Their opposition to the Code's prohibitions on the deliberate genetic modification of the human genome was one of the main reasons for Leonard Detweiler and his adherents to leave Beowulf and found the star nation of Mesa. (SI2)

References[]

↑ A standard and unchallenged practice before the Final War, the modification of human colonists for hostile environments ceased nearly everywhere for the next three centuries following the introduction of the Code. For almost a hundred years following its colonization by Detweiler and his adherents, Mesa was the sole place such modifications could be obtained.