Johnny Mercer, Bioethicist

I was posting about the musical Li'l Abner the other day; one of the songs that was cut from the movie, "Oh, Happy Day," is a pretty remarkable satirical song -- Johnny Mercer's lyric, in which a group of scientists exults over the possibility of making mankind "look, act, think feel, hope, desire, dream, buy and sell, inhale and exhale, exactly alike," is more relevant today, in the age when everybody's debating these issues as a reality, than it was almost 50 years ago, when much of this was still a fantasy:

Oh, happy day, when miracles take place
And scientists control the human race,
When we assume authority of human chromosomes,
And assembly-line women,
Conveyor-belt men,
Settle down in push-button homes.

Oh, happy day, when all the cells conform
And the exceptional become the norm,
When from a test-tube we produce gargantuas or gnomes,
And assembly-line women,
Conveyor-belt men,
Settle down in push-button homes.

So much of this, so much of that for the ears and eyes,
So much of that, so much of this for the toes and thighs.
Pour in a pot, stir up the lot, that's the basic plan,
What have we got? I'll tell you what: We've got man-made man!

Oh, happy day, when all the world can see
A healthy, hearty, hale humanity.
When even tired businessmen have hair upon their domes,
Slenderella-type mothers
And muscle-beach dads
Living in gymnasium homes.

Oh, happy day, when boys and girls on dates
Can tell electrically if they are mates.
If he goes for her kilowatts and she enjoys his omes,
You can bet your magnetic
Combustible shirt
They'll wind up in high-voltage homes.