Feb 15, 2026
3 min read
As new parents, Arthur Zey and Chase Popp think their son Dax is the best kid in the world.
Billionaires in Silicon Valley have made a 'dangerous' proposal to create genetically superior babies... and people are willing to pay a fortune to 'speed up evolution'
Like all new parents, Arthur Zee and his partner Chase Pope think their one-month-old son Dax is the most perfect baby in the world.They are proud as they boast about their good health, their happy demeanor and even their lack of diaper rash.
But unlike most parents, Zey and Pop don't attribute their son's wonderful nature to his father alone.
Last March, they selected six embryos created from Ze's sperm and a donor egg to implant into a surrogate mother.Genetic analysis gave them predictions for future heights, IQ and several health markers of viable fetuses.
Zee and Bob then chose who would be their first child, making young Dax a pioneer in today's brave new world of commercial eugenics.
Pop, a 29-year-old primary school teacher with her baby on her shoulders, said that everything they had seen of Dax so far confirmed their decision: 'Look at Dax, he's perfect, he's perfect for me.
"When [people] say he's a designer kid, I take that as a huge compliment: yes, he's a designer kid, and we're proud of it and he should be proud of it."
Zey, a 41-year-old technology product manager who takes time off to be a stay-at-home dad, says he wishes his parents had access to technology — like more muscle mass — when he conceived.
He told the Daily Mail: "If you have the power to make a child's life better, I think that's the responsible and compassionate thing to do."
Popp and Zey chose the fetus that would be their first child, making little Dax a pioneer in the new modern world of beauty guru.
The genetic analysis gave them predictions of future height, IQ and many health indicators for the survival of the living fetus
Although geneticists question the effectiveness of screening embryos for traits such as intelligence, mental health and height, this service is currently offered at alarming rates.Much of the research and development is funded by Silicon Valley tech bros who are obsessed with creating a super race of superhumans.
"Most of them don't care about what happens to you or me: They care about what happens in Silicon Valley," says Arthur Kaplan, head of medical ethics at New York University's Grossman School.
"[They think] that if we don't genetically alter our bodies somehow to survive the journey, we might not be able to go to Mars. Maybe AI will wipe out humanity because it's too smart, so we need a subset of humans to keep up with the AI's tricks."
It sounds like something out of dystopian science fiction: a genetically screened or enhanced class of people ruling over a genetically inferior class that cannot access or afford technology, as foretold in the 1997 science fiction film Gattaca starring Ethan Hawke.
In this film, famous people are tested for inheriting the best genes from their parents, while those who are naturally 'bad' are barred from entering the top jobs.
In 2018, Chinese scientist He Jiankui said he had created the first gene-edited babies, and claimed he had successfully modified the DNA in three embryos to produce HIV-free babies.He - who has called himself 'China's Darwin' and 'China's Oppenheimer' - was sentenced to three years in prison by Chinese authorities for violating medical regulations, and Beijing has banned any gene editing of reproductive cells.
In 2018, Chinese scientist He Jiankui said he had created the first genetically engineered babies, claiming to have successfully altered the DNA of three fetuses to create children immune to HIV.
He was released in 2022 and said he was determined to continue his research to eradicate conditions such as Alzheimer's in embryos.But he has a stern warning for those who want to spread science for non-medical purposes.
"Recently, some Silicon Valley billionaires have been working to improve human IQ, especially in babies," he told WIRED.
'I think it was a great Nazi experiment.It must stop.If we want to raise human IQ for billionaires, the scientists working on it should be arrested.'
It is not clear which billionaire or start-up he is talking about.Although research on human embryos is banned in most parts of the world, at least three Silicon Valley-backed companies are researching embryo editing.In the United States, it is illegal to edit the genes of fetuses to create babies.
Although companies say they are exploring the possibility of using gene editing for medical purposes to eliminate genetic diseases, academics are skeptical.
Fyodor Urnov, director of the Innovative Genomics Institute at the University of California, Berkeley, said that "embryo editors" are deceiving themselves and the public when they talk about using this technology to address the public health challenge of genetic disease.
"Their sole purpose is to 'improve children.'This is very dangerous and very bad.'
The San Francisco-based startup raised $30 million for immune reproductive gene editing research, backed by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and her husband, Coinbase co-founder Brian Armstrong.
Armstrong wrote on X that he envisions a future of Gattaca-style IVF clinics, where technologies including genetic testing and embryo editing will "accelerate evolution."
Nucleus Genomics has plastered the New York subway with posters encouraging people to 'have the perfect baby'.
Nucleus Genomics has backers including PayPal founder Peter Thiel
San Francisco-based startup Preventive has raised $30 million for its reproductive gene editing research and is backed by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and his wife and Coinbase co-founder Brian Armstrong.
Lucas Harrington, the founder of Preventive, declined to discuss the current research with the Daily Mail, but he attacked He Jiancui.
"We are deeply concerned by He Jiankui's recent public statements indicating his intention to pursue embryo editing again, particularly given his apparent lack of remorse for the reckless and unethical nature of his past work," Harrington said.
“There are very real potential risks to genetic genome editing, and any responsible approach in this field must begin with rigorous and transparent preclinical safety studies.”
The risks, Kaplan says, are that healthy genes are misdirected, or that DNA can be damaged in a way that has unintended consequences.
Then there are the moral dilemmas: Who decides what is medical and what is developmental, and what genetic traits are good or bad?Will technology increase inequality?Can authoritarian regimes abuse it?
Although gene editing in embryos has been decades from becoming a reality, several companies have emerged that offer genetic screening.
Nucleus Genomics plastered the New York subway with posters urging people to "make the best baby."The company -- whose PayPal founder is Peter Thiel -- analyzes traits like acne, hair color, male pattern baldness, anxiety and alcohol addiction.
Parents Arthur Zey and Chase Popp were replaced by Herasight, which was launched last year.
For a $50,000 price tag, Hercyte says it can analyze the fetus and give parents clues about future traits like IQ and height, as well as risk factors like schizophrenia, psoriasis and type 2 diabetes.
Jonathan Anomaly, Herasight's director of research and communications, is concerned that terrorist talk about words like 'eugenics' will create an environment where governments prevent parents from choosing their child's genes.
"It is not appropriate to use this word for provocation," he said.
Popp and Zey passed on Herasight, which began operations last year
Pope said everything he's seen of Dax so far supports their decision: 'When I look at Dax, he looks good overall, he seems healthy.'
Through IVF, embryo-screening techniques have been available for several years to modify single genes that cause chromosomal abnormalities and inherited diseases such as sickle cell anemia, cystic fibrosis, and Huntington's disease.boy
However, many of the diseases and traits that Herasight studies are polygenic, meaning they are linked to many different genes.This makes it "almost impossible" to identify and predict any outcome, Urnov said.
Anomaly disagrees: Herasight is said to have access to data from several human biobanks around the world and has analyzed the genomes of at least half a million people to determine genetic variants of the traits it offers for analysis.
“In the short term, science has advanced very rapidly and will continue to do so,” he said.
He acknowledges that currently the services are mainly for the wealthy, and says that his client list includes a few well-known billionaires, but he expects the price to drop as the process becomes less labor intensive.
Zey believes that genetic segregation and unimprovement may exist in the future, but he believes that "a rising tide lifts every ship" and that a group of smarter people helps humanity become better.
And she's sure Baby Dax will be up there with the best.Although she and Popp chose the embryo with the highest longevity prediction, the IQ score was also high.
"Do we expect him to be brilliant? Yes," said Zee.
Zey and Popp were given free access to the technology as an initial proof of concept for Herasight, but Caplan believes there are plenty of ultra-wealthy people willing to buy the benefits for themselves – even though they've probably only been given a glimmer of hope.
"Just look at what people in DC or New York will spend on a fancy private school and spend $90,000 on daycare," he said."So when people say, 'Is there a market?'
