Genome Researchers Wants Your Genes 165
An anonymous reader writes "The Beijing Genomics Institute (BGI) is looking for smart volunteers to donate their genes for analysis. They are seeking subjects with high intelligence; you can only qualify if you got a high score in SAT/ACT/GRE or got awards in competitions like Math/Physics Olympiads or TopCoder. They're also launching a drive to recruit US participants. Their first stop (PDF) appears to have been Google, which has run into trouble with the Chinese government. Also worth noting: BGI is registered in China as an 'Institutional Organization,' which by law requires it to report to a supervising governmental office or agency."
ACT score of 35 or 36? (Score:2)
Those with a 33 (like me) need not apply, I guess.
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"Those with a 33 (like me) need not apply, I guess."
Nonsense! I'm sure they'll need a control group. At least that's what I suggested when I applied.
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Of course, if it IS an attempt to get western-looking donors of high intelligence for a breeding program, they'll be disappointed - most of them will look asian :-)
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But those with a 36 (like me) could.
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Wow, and they're looking for 1580 SAT scores or better (verbal/math only, apparently, which is how it was when i took it, 1600 max).
That's 780V and 800M. Nothing less than perfection in math. There's a joke about the chinese and math in here somewhere, I'm sure of it.
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There's no reason that SAT score couldn't come from an 800V and 780M, you know.
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Intrusion (Score:3, Interesting)
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There should be outrage over this kind of thing and where it could possibly lead mankind.
Better?
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Nor would it be a good idea. Cutting down the gene pool is a generically bad idea. Too much risk of damage, besides it's hard to imagine a way to restrict the gene pool without committing an atrocity.
That being said, there's nothing wrong with studying this simply for the pure s
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I'm leery of committing the "reductio ad Hitlerum" ("it's wrong just because Hitler did it") fallacy here. (However, "Hitler did this, and this is wrong because X, so Hitler was wrong in this regard” is perfectly logical; you do seem to take that approach.
This particular discussion also doesn't get into other things the Nazis did, or other things that China is doing.
However, I wonder if eugenics based on things like severe mental/physical disability is different in a practical sense from racial/ethnic
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If the same policy were applied to a smaller ethnic group, say the Amish (I choose the Amish because they are an isolated group that occasionally fac
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It's not intrusion since they're looking for volunteers.
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Consider this scenario: let's say that, due to whatever correlation (e.g. exposure to testosterone/finger length), those measurements indeed mapped to greater brain weight, less cancer risk, you name it. What happens next? Shall we drop those scientific findings because they are politically incorrect?
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Well you can either ignore the findings or start genetically selecting or modifying babies and hope you know what you are doing.
We already do that kind of thing by looking for problems in the unborn, and optionally terminating the pregnancy if the child has a severe disability. Well, actually it doesn't have to be that severe, in the UK something like cleft palette is enough. I'm not going to get into making a judgement here, I am just pointing out that we are already half way down that very slippery slope.
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the pendulum swings... (Score:1)
A couple of generations ago, eugenics got a bad name by taking things too far under the Nazi's.
Social liberalism experiments of breading a permanent underclass of welfare recipients should get just as bad a rap.
Unless you love the smell of barbarians burning your civilization.
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Well, I'm a clod you insensitive barbarian. Intelligence is more than just puzzle solving and number crunching. Intelligence is not a continuum, it's a spectrum. This reductionism of intelligence to what basically amounts to math skills (let's face it, even the verbal GRE test is really a logic test) is limited. Useful in some dimensions, but limited.
I don't know any personally, but I'm willing to bet that most sports geniuses wouldn't score that well on an ACT or SAT. Nor would a lot of artists who ar
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While I agree that there's lots of types of intelligence, that doesn't mean that puzzle solving and number crunching isn't a thing worth studying. Like if they asked for people who could pitch the fastest fastball, it's accurate to say that there's a lot of other ways to be a great pitcher, but that doesn't mean that fastball speed isn't a thing that can be looked at.
As for whether gifted artists would score well on those tests -- I'm not really familiar with those tests, since I'm not American, but I thin
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While it is true we don't really know why they're after this (their motivations are what we should be appalled at), in this case it's voluntary. With the Nazi's many of their subjects for those purposes did not have a choice. So at least their methods in this case are better in that regard.
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Of course people were not "appalled". It was once quite common to take head measurements; it was called "Having your head examined". It was regarded on a similar level as fortune telling - seriously by some, or as a bit of fun by others. Thomas Hardy had it done for example, and there is a scene in Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" where Marlow has it done as part of a company medical.
Later "Having your head examined" became a joke term, eg saying to someone about to
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After World War 2 people were appalled to find out that the Nazi government were building up files of peoples measurements of faces and other such measurements to show / prove their master race theory. Isn't having DNA taken the exact same thing? There should be outrage over this kind of thing and where it could possibly lead mankind.
Two observations to note here. First, the files of measurements would have made no difference to the conclusion. The Nazis already knew what the "master race" was going to be. It was an empty ritual with a predetermined outcome. Second, how would you have expressed your disapproval of the Nazi's gimmick in a way that would matter?
In other words, the Nazi research didn't cause the Nazi government nor their loathsome ideology. Nor would outrage at such research have made one wit of difference. So why shoul
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The goal was to try and breed the master race by favouring parents who were more likely to produce children with the traits they wanted. It is unknown how far that would have gone but there was consideration given to enforced sterilisation on an even larger scale than they were already doing it.
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The goal was to try and breed the master race by favouring parents who were more likely to produce children with the traits they wanted. It is unknown how far that would have gone but there was consideration given to enforced sterilisation on an even larger scale than they were already doing it.
Yes, this is all well known. Again I ask the question. Why protest when the protest would be insignificant? Even if the Chinese (or some private entity that happens to be working with the current Chinese government) are trying to breed a master race behind the scenes, so what? Your and Wowsers's disapproval means nothing to them. Nor does global "outrage" which traditionally is toothless.
To state the obvious, only overthrow of the current Chinese government by peaceful means or by force would make any di
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So what you're saying is that the tea party argument is identical to the one advanced by the Nazis? Making Tea Partiers and similar right-wing movements the American equivalent of Nazis?
Niiice.... I wonder who the equivalent of Hitler would be then? Bachmann?
Everyone's thinking it, I'm just saying it... (Score:4, Funny)
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They'll engineer super-soldiers to be so smart that they'll end up resolving conflicts through rational discussion rather than violence.
Re:resolving conflicts through rational discussion (Score:5, Funny)
Lin Yutang once wrote that if you gave leaders a good meal and a comedy show, they wouldn't get into wars.
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So what happens when the soldiers suggest that each of the Chinese minorities gets their own country?
In fact the EU model is something that would work if each of the Chinese provinces became countries. The differences between the provinces are far more than those between the US states, and differences between EU countries are too great for it to stay as it is for too much longer.
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I'll spell out the apparent XKCD reference: http://xkcd.com/356/ [xkcd.com]
Valid evolutionary strategy? (Score:1)
Anyone smart enough to qualify should be smart enough to hold out for a better offer. :|
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My thought was that they shouldn't be using SAT, ACT or GRE scores as they're known to be more influenced by ones household income and motivation than intellect. Despite the complaints, the reality is that a properly designed and normed IQ test would be far more informative than any of those tests would be in this area.
As for the other qualifications, not going to be of any sort of meaningful help as there are tons of ways in which one can win them, they aren't likely to find any useful genes as a result.
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Given when he was born and normal school progression, Feynman's IQ test would have happened around somewhere around 1933. At that point in time, it was likely an early Stanford-Binet [wikipedia.org] test, which was only slightly older than Feynman himself then. I seriously doubt the 124 score had any accuracy, given it's believed Feynman was already wandering around doing Calculus around the same age he took the test.
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I was pointing out that the predictive power of a circa 1933 IQ score and that of a more recently designed one are not necessarily the same. You can't prove they aren't useful nowadays with data about how well they tracked ability from eighty years ago.
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The ones who bleat the hardest about how IQ is so important are the ones who are so stupid that, despite having a high IQ, they have to pay $60 a year to a club that will attest to their worth so they can feel good about themselves.
If they were really smart, they would have quoted Grouch Marx instead when someone tried to pitch it to them - "I wouldn't join any club that would have me
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I'm not a member, nor would I likely qualify, but I don't see a problem with people joining a group based on something they all have in common. That's what most groups are, after all.
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Try this on for size. "We want you to join our group of blonde, blue-eyed, fair-skinned people." I qualify, but if someone asked me that, I'd be creeped out. Are they KKK? Neo-nazis? White Supremists?
"We want you to pay $60 a year to belong to a group of people whose IQ puts them in the top 2%. Benefits include being able
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So.. everyone with a high IQ must be a boring Buzzkillingtong that can only make jokes about the archduke?
How can the mensa test have cultural bias? I remember doing it when I was 17 I didn't see a single cultural or economically-biased question, passed barely, but I was not motivated to join because everyone started to script my future (oh you should be doctor, oh you should be a lawyer) I made myself friend of the head of the local office and "dumped the database" in a floppy. I'm still in touch with som
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Sample questions that exhibit cultural bias:
Q.One of the following proverbs is closest in meaning to the saying, "Birds of a feather, flock together." Choose one:
Q. One of the following sentences given below means approximately the same as the proverb: "Don't count your chickens until they are hatched." Choose the one:
Two questions that depend on knowledge of a specific culture and common language idioms.
Many tests depend on "inside knowledge" of a parti
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WTF is that?
All my questions were abstract reasoning, cattell raven model. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raven's_Progressive_Matrices [wikipedia.org]
Is this really from Mensa? Well then, theres a regional bias, they actually look for high IQ outside developed nations. Everything else IT'S A TRAP, glad I didn't joined.
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I guess I just don't see why, of all the groups out there, you'd pick Mensa to hate on. It seems like a pretty benign group.
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I take it your score wasn't high enough to gain entrance.
Believe it or not, sometimes it's nice to have people available that are cognitively strong enough that they represent some challenge. It's astonishingly annoying to argue with people that lack the education and cognitive faculties to put up a decent argument.
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You take it wrong.
Then make it fun (or do you lack the *ahem* education and cognitive faculties to do so???). That's what white-hat trolling is for. Fun AND educational. Troll Tuesday exis
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Thanks for proving my point for me. This is precisely what I was talking about. Einstein didn't only hang out with 8 year olds, he also hung out with some of the most intellectually advanced individuals of his generation a group which one would have a really hard time typically meeting.
It's not that they can't make friends, it's that sometimes it's nice to spend time with folks that are actually interested in carrying on an intelligent conversation. And for somebody that is apparently anti-intellectual, I'm
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That was a consequence of his job. Helping an 8-year-old with her math in return for jelly beans, was not. And since they questioned it, they weren't that smart if they couldn't see the value in it. So no, I didn't "prove your point for you", Einstein.
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Argumentation is not your strength. Your argument has this form:
You:
1. You're too stupid to be like me.
2. I'm better than people like you.
He/she counter-argues.
You:
1. I win the argument (implied: because you are too stupid to understand your own argument).
2. Irrelevant statement that shows you misses the point.
3. Casual, incredible arrogance, combined with strawman attacks.
4. BTW, I win the argument (implied: because you are too stupid to understand your own argument).
Their most frequent ambassador
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
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That's easy, she lived to become that old because she didn't die. As noble as it is, it's doubtful that they'll find any useful information as the people who lived to be 100+ years old are just the tail end of the distribution, there's as much luck involved as anything else.
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That's easy, she lived to become that old because she didn't die. As noble as it is, it's doubtful that they'll find any useful information as the people who lived to be 100+ years old are just the tail end of the distribution, there's as much luck involved as anything else.
You give no citations to support your hypothesis.
Sheer luck might perhaps be the case, but without research one might miss a genetic connection, which could then potentially enable either medical or lifestyle changes that could mimic the genetic differences.
As one example of a possible genetic link to some aspects of aging see e.g.
http://www.einstein.yu.edu/home/news.asp?id=454 [yu.edu]
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Lazarus Long, is that you?
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Yes.
Don't have a surgical procedure. Request cremation upon death. Those are your options.
The surgical consent forms will specify that tissue removed during surgery is medical waste that becomes the property
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I would realy like it to be some sort of GPL where findings are actually intended for the general public.
Does anybody have any experience with such a thing?
Yes.
Don't have a surgical procedure. Request cremation upon death. Those are your options.
Even then, you might run into problems. Many state governments are routinely keeping samples of all citizens from birth [slashdot.org] -- and many store them indefinitely, with no easy way for parents or citizens to get them released or destroyed. There have been cases where these samples have made it into the hands of private researchers with little or no oversight.
Whether or not such policies have affected the GP is a different question, but for new people born nowadays, it's getting ever harder to stay out of such
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be sure that not some Monsanto makes a shitload of money from it by patenting the shit out of my dead body.
It takes work to turn a dead body into a potential cure, and then it takes lots of money to test that cure and make sure it's safe and effective. I expect that any company that undertakes such a project will want to be sure that they can get something back for their investment.
Personally, I'd give my DNA away for free, and hope that I or my descendants can benefit from the new discoveries even if we have to pay for them. It's much better than not having access to these discoveries at all because they do
Can't resist asking... (Score:1)
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If we could do it with sheep 20 years ago then why would you think that we cannot do it with humans right now?
I think that the ONLY barrier is ethics and general denial from the general public.
I mean, it's not as if they ask for people with a common genetic illness that they can study and cure.
They specifically ask for very smart people to be studied, but what kind of study will this be and how will the results be applied?
Cloning a bunch of super-smart people seems certainly like something they may asspire
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...body to science..but be sure that not some Monsanto makes a shitload of money from it by patenting the shit out of my dead body.
Damn. There goes their plans to make "Plants vs. Zombies" into a reality TV show.
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Old people are old because they haven't died of the things that kill people. That sounds trite, but it is literally a summary of everything we know about increasing longevity. People aren't living longer, the survival function is simply getting squarer.
obligatory reading on this subject matter: (Score:5, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henrietta_Lacks [wikipedia.org]
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HeLa cells can multiply ad infitum, unlike any other kind ... but they're not Henrieta's native cells, but cancer-derived cells (as far as wikipedia tells).
Cancer cells are not generally invading cells with an origin outside the body. (Only about 20% of cancers are caused by viruses.) Most of their genetic makeup is from the person they inhabit. They just have some small genetic mutation that leads to unfettered reproduction.
It may not have been a desirable change, but it was in fact an internal change in someone's body that caused this. Therefore I'm not sure that these are not "Henrietta's native cells." They may not have the exact DNA that the origin
limited selection (Score:1)
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Realistically, the trade deficit says just as much about the type of society that the Chinese are interested in creating.
Re:limited selection (Score:5, Insightful)
No, the fact that they're limiting their selection means that they are looking for a specific link between high standardized test scores/academic achievement and the inability to recognize people by face [wikipedia.org]. No one is apparently bothering to read the first paragraph on that web page.
We are recruiting subjects for a Genome Wide Association Study of intelligence. Our study of prosopagnosia has not yet begun; if you wish to learn more about this condition, please visit faceblind.org.
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No, the fact that they're limiting their selection means that they are looking for a specific link between high standardized test scores/academic achievement and the inability to recognize people by face. No one is apparently bothering to read the first paragraph on that web page.
Why are you surprised that the Chinese are interested in studying why people lose face?
Researchers can damn well get their own jeans (Score:1)
No way, I just bought these!
Then they are looking in the wrong place. (Score:2)
From brutal experience I can attest to the fact that most people on Slashdot, save myself, are not that smart. ;)
GC
Very narrow definition of intelligence (Score:2)
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Re:Very narrow definition of intelligence (Score:4, Insightful)
All you people need to RTFM (and click the FAQ):
https://www.cog-genomics.org/faq/ [cog-genomics.org]
What is intelligence?
No one knows precisely what intelligence is, and even experts disagree as to how it should be defined. However, it has been known for over a century that performance on different cognitive tests is positively correlated: for example, someone who is good at math puzzles is also more likely to have an above average vocabulary. Given a battery of tests and their correlation matrix, one can use probability theory to define a single parameter that, in a sense, optimally compresses the information from administering them all.
In practice, a wide range of intuitively sensible test batteries and functions of their score vectors yield very similar estimates of this parameter. As a result, psychologists consider these functions of test batteries to all be reasonable estimators of a parameter called the General Factor of Intelligence, or g for short.
From the use of phrases like "intuitively sensible", it should be clear that the definition of g is a little bit arbitrary. However, we believe that it's the most promising metric to base an intelligence GWAS on. The most important properties of g are:
stability (scores tend not to vary significantly after adolescence),
heritability (twin and adoption studies suggest that much of the variance in g is due to genetics), and
predictive power (g scores are correlated with academic and job performance, income, longevity, etc., even after controlling for other variables such as social class).
At least they know their results have limited scope.
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sounds like a good screwing over (Score:2)
What? You want my genes so you can patent them and start charing me a monthly fee, to live?
Screw you!!!!!
Where's a provocative, definitive Captain Picard lecture when you need one?
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"You can have my DNA when you biopsy it from my cold, dead hand!"
Let the clone wars begin! (Score:2)
I mean isn't this where this is headed?
Actually, as long as they're doing this, does anyone know if the volunteers get a copy of the sequence? Even for The forseeable future, a full sequencing of your DNA would cost thousands(?) of dollars. Might be worth it! (I wonder if I qualify).
I also wonder if they're trying to obtain the DNA of some very smart people, dead or alive. For example the DNA from Einstein's brain which is preserved somewhere or perhaps Feynman (if they can find any samples, maybe on hi
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Being There [wikipedia.org]. A wonderful film.
And yes, I like to watch...
Read "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" (Score:1)
I used my intelligence (Score:2)
to avoid taking those tests or letting the government know how smart I am (or am not).
=)
As one who would qualify ... (Score:1)
let me say: You need to work on your subject/verb agreement. "researchers wants"?
While I qualify, I don't think I'll participate. Thanks but no thanks.
First they came for the geniuses, (Score:3, Funny)
Maths smart or what? (Score:2)
This is contentious. Do they mean maths/science smart? Or like art/abstract smart. Because it seems you can have different kinds of intelligence. For instance, someone could be a mathematician and be terrible in other subjects that involve different kinds of thought. I think it would be more useful if they got people who were accomplished writers, artists, musicians etc. and mapped their DNA as well, rather than just focussing on one particular kind of intelligence (scientific/analytical intelligence).
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"wants" (Score:1)
Cylons? (Score:2)
Just me then.
Boycott (Score:2)
No way! (Score:1)
Hmmph (Score:2)
Help China? They can suck my dick.
Oh wait...
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