I was rather astonished to wake up and find that our little band had not addressed one of the most momentous events of our, or any lifetime, announced yesterday: The creation of synthetic life.

TO CREATE life is the prerogative of gods. Deep in the human psyche, whatever the rational pleadings of physics and chemistry, there exists a sense that biology is different, is more than just the sum of atoms moving about and reacting with one another, is somehow infused with a divine spark, a vital essence. It may come as a shock, then, that mere mortals have now made artificial life.

This has such profound moral and philosophical impacts that my head is spinning with both marvel and concern.

What do we think those impacts will be?
Is regulation appropriate or indeed viable, and what boundaries should it seek to enforce?
At present, one individual and hist trust "owns" this technology - how does the world approach that?
For those who believe in a Creator God, what challenges does Creator Man have for that faith?
Bio-labs are impossible to deny to most nations of any technological standing. They are much less visible to concerned international bodies. How then will it be possible to stop rogue nations (or indeed, rogue groups) cooking up weapons of mass destruction that make nuclear pale into insignificance?
A personal thought provoked by one of the uses proposed, that of carbon dioxide eating bacteria, engineered to remove CO2 from the atmosphere and secrete bio-fuels. Great idea, but what happens if they get out of (say) BP's vats and start metabolising the air in your lungs into crude oil?

I am dizzy with the excitement of such an incredible piece of science, and the implications of having life created by human beings.