Introduction
Literature used within bioethics has remained relatively absent from sport ethical discussions, though the way in which performance enhancement is used in sport gives rise to some worthwhile comparisons. Notably, anti-doping policy relies heavily upon principles of medical ethics (Beauchamp and Childress, 1994), as a basis for determining what kind of performance enhancement is legitimate. However, a problematisation of medical ethics has seldom influenced discussions about what is ethical in sport. Rather, ethical decisions tend to be made on the basis of a concern for what is medically ‘harmful’ or what is ethically ‘unfair.’ The prospects of genetic selection in sport and the use of genetic technology more generally make the links between these two disciplines explicit (Miah, 2001a, 2002, Munthe, 2002).

Discussion
This paper explores the ethical implications of gene selection in sport, based upon a critique of the values expressed and implicit of striving to identify performance genes. Specifically, this paper is concerned with the use of genetic technologies to identify prospective athletes, though it juxtaposes this process of selection with the more accepted process of conventional selection methods.

It is argued that the process of selection in general is an undesirable characteristic of sport, which re-affirms specific kinds of values associated with competition. It promotes the tendency to evaluate others in instrumental terms and serves more to benefit the selectors rather than the selected. Additionally, genetic selection undermines the value of ‘autonomy’, though more significantly brings into question the capacity for an athlete to realise what is valued for them in sporting performance, thus compromising their individual ‘authenticity’. Moreover, talent selection instils a reductionist or essentialist perspective of performance in sport, unreasonably prioritising the role of the gene in performance. This ethical analysis of talent selection is also placed into the broader bioethical context of how genetic information might be used in sport, raising issues about athletes’ rights (Australian Law Reforms Commission, 2001, Miah, 2001b).Conclusion
It is concluded that the practice of talent selection serves merely to reinforce elitist aspirations in sport and that using genetic selection would raise a number of practical, ethical issues that require careful consideration. Furthermore, genetic selection would undermine the concern for individual athletes to such an extent that the entire process becomes divorced from any sense of value in sport, except where sporting value is understood in purely quantitative terms. This latter view of sport is to be avoided, particularly in the developmental stages of an athlete’s career.

References
Australia Law Reforms Commission, (2001) Issues Paper 26 Protection of Human Genetic Information - 12. Other services and contexts. Sydney, Australian Law Reforms Commission:

Beauchamp, T. L. and J. F. Childress. (1994) Principles of Biomedical Ethics, 4th ed.,
New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Miah, A. (2001a) 'Genetic Technologies and Sport: The New Ethical Issue', Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, XXVIII: 32-52.

Miah, A. (2001b) 'Genetics, Privacy, and Athletes' Rights', Sports Law Bulletin, 4, 5: 10-12.

Munthe, C. (2002) 'Prospects and Tensions in the Meeting of Bioethics and the Philosophy of Sports: A Response to Miah (2002). In A. Miah and S. B. Eassom. Sport Technology: History, Philosophy and Policy. Oxford, Elsevier Science: 291-299.

Tamburrini, C. M. (2002) 'After Doping What? The Morality of the Genetic Engineering of Athletes', in A. Miah and S. B. Eassom. Sport Technology: History, Philosophy and Policy. Oxford, Elsevier Science: 253-268.