Author Jose Canseco, once a candidate for Cooperstown, will never be a candidate for a Pulitzer Prize, but his muck-raking book in which he “outs” players who avoided outs with the illegal use of anabolic steroids has re-invigorated the debate about a different book — the record book.

There are two ways to look at the question of what to do with the Major League records of steroid-enhanced ballplayers. One way is to look to the past when ball players performed without the assistance of body-building compounds. The other is to look forward in the future when ball players may be superhuman.

Modern science being what it is, it is conceivable that in fifty to sixty years — roughly the same interval of time that ran its course between Barry Bonds and Babe Ruth — players will be endowed with physical strength, endurance, youth and eyesight that make the skills of players today look like Little League. The steroids in use today might appear to be wonder drugs with the power to turn Lenny Dykstra from a 170 pound singles hitter into a 220 pound slugger, but they are more likely to be prehistoric pablum in comparison to what modern medicine has in store for us.

The world may just be on the leading edge of the next phase of evolution, a segue in human development that will elevate “man as thinking man” into the “man as machine” age, as drastic a leap as took place 100,000 years ago when modern Homo Sapiens descended from some form of Lucy?

A man in his fifties today is living the life his father had in his forties. Why, a guy can pop a harmless pill to get an erection! Future generations will live longer and play games longer than ours, and they will become the beneficiaries of stem cell technology that will enable them to overcome the hazards of aging and disease which can interrupt a career.

In the last two decades alone, there has been a greater advance in pharmacology, immunization, surgical science, prosthesis and cloning than ever before. Fifty years from now, when genetic engineering becomes commonplace, couples may be able to custom-design their offspring to be Ted Williams, and “The Kid” himself may be back for career No. 2, given the wild probabilities of the unforeseen.

Where, then, will we place the Major League records of a slugger who can play 40 years with flawless eyesight or a pitcher who can throw 120 mph with a bionic arm?

Professor Robin Hanson of George Mason University, who deals in the study of economics as they relate to future technologies, believes that no changes in the record book are necessary.

“New technologies are likely to change the world so much in the next century or two that our descendents will in many ways no longer be human,” Hanson once said about the idea of “trans-humanism,” which is one of the concepts at play in the prediction that higher types of bodily instrumentation will wreak havoc with the record books anyway.

“We don’t adjust the record books now, even though the participants of today have better shoes, better medical care,” Hanson said. “But when technology adds noise to the signal of genetic quality, we don’t like it. What worries us is that we’re not seeing the true person, but an augmentation,” he says about steroids and medical enhancement of the human form.

Hanson says that our intuitions about what is fair and unfair is rooted in our evolutionary heritage, that sports were a way for our ancestors to provide a comparison of genetic ability. Regarding the fairness doctrine, New York Yankees fan Crystal Stango of Lakewood, N.J., explains it more simply. “As long as everyone has the same opportunity, the game seems fair to me,” she said.

Clearly, not all players have been approaching the game lately with Stango’s concept of fairness, and that is what is wrong with recent records in the eyes of fans. Moreover, the records were compiled under a cloud of suspicion; the fans were never told the truth about what is going on until after it occurred. 

The destructive nature of steroids is so devastating in terms of human health, it is simply irresponsible to allow the unfettered use of them. Although the players who have used steroids may have had an unfair advantage over those who did not, those people who permitted the use of steroids may have caused even greater harm to the game than the players.

The owners and managers of Major League Baseball teams belittled themselves with an ignorant avoidance of the problem, all for the grail of renewed interest in their business. Now they must stem the erosion of trust that is certain to follow the appearance of Canseco’s trashy pronouncements at bookstores and on television. Respect is an attribute too distant to renew.

Finally, while the owners are busy dealing with the past, it is time for them to be planning for the future. Preventing players who utilize medical technology to enhance their bodies from participating in coming decades will be a battle that Major League Baseball is certain to lose.

Considering what lies ahead, changing the records now would be making the asterisk the 27th letter of the alphabet.