Scientists Hold A Secret Meeting To Consider Creating A Synthetic Human Genome (gizmodo.com) 153
An anonymous reader writes from a report via The New York Times, summarized by Gizmodo: Earlier this week, over a hundred scientists, lawyers, and entrepreneurs held a secret meeting to discuss the possibility of creating a synthetic human genome. Creating a synthetic human genome differs from gene editing as scientists would use chemicals to manufacture all the DNA contained in human chromosomes, instead of patching a gene here and there. Synthetic genomics, unlike genetic modifications, in that it doesn't use naturally occurring genes. Instead, it relies on the custom-designed base pair series. Currently, customers view synthetic genomics as a way to build novel microbes and animals, but with humans it raises the prospect of custom-designed humans, without any parents. George Church, a professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School and one of the organizers of the proposed project, says the characterization was a misunderstanding, and that the project was aimed to generally improve the ability to synthesize long strands of DNA, which could be applied to various types of animals, plants and microbes. "They're painting a picture which I don't think represents the project," Dr. Church said in an interview. The project was initially called "HGP2: The Human Genome Synthesis Project." However, the name was later changed to "HGP-Write: Testing Large Synthetic Genomes In Cells." Why the change? Because the original headline was suppose to be headline-grabbing, or so they say.
if it's on Slashdot (Score:2)
Re:if it's on Slashdot (Score:4, Funny)
It's still as close as makes any practical difference.
iPhone-like Secret leak (Score:3)
Designer Babe (Score:1)
The plot of Weird Science comes to mind. Bad dick; go to sleep!
Why start there? (Score:2)
Why not start small like with a squirrel? or anything else that won't be able to sue after it grows up...
Or we're they just talking about trying to get the DNA to assemble?
Either way are they planning to make use of the new letters?
https://science.slashdot.org/s... [slashdot.org]
Yes. (Score:2)
I'll be done soon enough, might as well get it over with.
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be done soon enough,
That's not soon enough!
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But building a person one molecule at a time in committee? If it took them one minute per molecule, and they worked 8 hour days, 5 days a week, it's take them 24,000 years to assem
naah, it'll only take about a month for a team (Score:2)
of 9 women
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You'd make a really poor god and a very bad dictator.
We already have enough problems caused by puberty coming before emotional maturity.
Utility --- UTILITY!!! Utility to whom? To you, the big boss, who decides how people should be? A person's sole reason for existence is his own well-being, not utility. Go hold Jeremy Bentham's hand on the way to hell.
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Sounds like fun. Build the ideal human, including genetic resistance to all known diseases, building in an ideal weight, and heart rate that's lower, and eliminating as many issues of aging as possible. Maximum intellect, earliest possible puberty, and maximize the utility of the person. The design goals are obvious enough. But building a person one molecule at a time in committee? If it took them one minute per molecule, and they worked 8 hour days, 5 days a week, it's take them 24,000 years to assemble a human. If they worked 24/7, it'd take them only 6000 years. So they'd only need 24,000 committees working in parallel to complete this in one year (8 by 5) So far, leaking at 100% from meetings, it'd likely not be secret for long.
And when it's done..... it turns out to be Donald Trump! AAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!
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It wouldn't be hard to engineer night visio
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Right, like we shouldn't shield ourselves from the elements with things like clothes and houses. After all, if evolution couldn't solve the problem, it'd be pure hubris for us to address it directly ourselves.
Fix all evolution's mistakes. Give us a furry coat to shield us from the elements. Have us use all 4 limbs to reduce the strain on our spines. Eliminate the modifications to our throat which allow us to modify our vocalizations, but at the cost of higher rate of choking on food. Reduce the size of the brain so that cranial size can be smaller and all that trouble with giving birth is eliminated. Maybe add a tail for counterbalancing to improve our rapid mobility.
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Because, after all, we could do a much better job of designing a human than evolution did.
Of course, we could. The obvious rebuttal here is twofold: evolution is vastly slower than human efforts and we're not solving the same problems. Evolution solved the problem of human survival in a world of virtually no technology or human organization beyond the small tribe. Meanwhile, we are willing to compromise on human survival in a pre-civilization environment in exchange for significant advantages in our current anad future civilization environment.
As to the first point, how will we expect evoluti
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Na, all you would would make is a gooey mess. The reason that we aren't seven feet tall, have proportions of a Greek god(dess)**, live forever, are immune to radiation, disease, pop under ads and Internet Trolls is because life is a compromise. What works in one environment doesn't work in others.
You might get an ADD, autism, depression and psychosis resistant brain and find you ended up with a clone of Pee Wee Herman.
Careful what you ask for, you might get it.
** Or whatever your ideal body form might be
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The primary UV blocking element of the eye is the lens. Some people who have had their lenses replaced (due to cataracts) with a plastic that doesn't block UV suddenly are able to see in the UV range http://petapixel.com/2012/04/17/the-human-eye-can-see-in-ultraviolet-when-the-lens-is-removed/ [petapixel.com].
The lens cuts off at about 350 nm (although that varies a great deal with age). The cornea cuts off at about 280 nm.
Near UV (350-400 nm) for normal people is sensed as violet, and it's hard to focus.
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It wouldn't be hard to engineer night vision. The hardest part to that is engineeerin the changes to the lense to allow in UV. We've evolved to block UV in the lense, so as to protect our cornea, but engineering humans to be penta-chromats (we already have tetra-chromats, just rare), and have the 5th be in the UV spectrum. You'd need to have sunglasses, or UV blocking contact lenses, but at night, the glow in the atmosphere would give a pretty reasonable night vision.
Night vision has nothing to do with UV light perception. (UV comes from the sun, just like most of the rest of light. There isn't an atmospheric night-glow of UV, but there might be some UV from starlight.) Our cornea is on the outside and blocks UV, so that it isn't absorbed in the lens (which makes it become cloudy and you blind).
As a side note, you can already see UV light. You just see it as an uncolored brightness instead of a specific color.
wouldn't IR be better?
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The 6 day time frame was just to restore Earth to a habitable state again and repopulate it after He wiped out Lucifer's kingdom by a flood. That said, not having a committee to deal with or regulations to adhere to was probably a time saver. The next judgment is also going to be apocalyptic.
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The 6 day time frame was just to restore Earth to a habitable state again and repopulate it after He wiped out Lucifer's kingdom by a flood. That said, not having a committee to deal with or regulations to adhere to was probably a time saver. The next judgment is also going to be apocalyptic.
Pretty clear when He was getting towards the end, creating humans, He was pretty much just cutting corners and trying to get it wrapped up before the weekend.
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We have a teen pregnancy problem because we have extended "childho
Re: If they can't keep a meeting secret, how can w (Score:2)
What could possible go wrong? Oh, wait...
KHAAAAAAAAN!
Not much of a secret (Score:2)
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Why is this being done in secret? Why not be open about your plans? What is there to hide about science?
They were meeting with the Climatologists' Cartel.
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It's often (especially in controversial cases like this) easier to ask forgiveness than permission.
That's how religion works.
I just invested heavily in popcorn (Score:3)
The Right To Life types will go absolutely berserk over this. The whole religious underpinning of the movement...the one they never like to talk about...will have to decide whether a human created by man should enjoy the same protection as a human created by their god.
And when there's no sperm and egg union to enshrine as the moment when life begins, where will they draw the line? At what point during the assembly process does the thing in the dish deserve to be called human? A chimp shares all but 4% of our DNA, after all.
This should be fun!
Re:I just invested heavily in popcorn (Score:4, Insightful)
You say this as if they are going to engineer a human being in our lifetime. Maybe your naturally conceived grand children can use your "Popcorn stock" before they die of old age at 400+ years old,but I don't think even they will see the glorious immaculate conception you are hoping for..
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Sure they will. I bet it won't even take 10 years.
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What protection do you think you have now, and why?
Since I know you won't invoke a "soul", show me your "has rights" DNA sequence in contrast to other animals' "does not have rights" sequence.
Bonus points if you are a vegetarian, and thus not a total lifelong hypocrite.
Re: I just invested heavily in popcorn (Score:1)
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He said, "O Lord, there are many around the drinking trough, but there is nothing in the cistern."
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Great...does this mean I now get to quote from a more important book...like one of the Harry Potter volumes, or maybe "Letters From The Earth"?
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Sure.
In fact, we should even then restudy your quote, say, in 150 years.
Pencil you in? Bring friends.
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You think you'll be around then? LOL. The only hope of an afterlife is if we figure out how to do it ourselves...maybe by downloading our mind into some kind of computer.
And then, yet again, humans will have stuffed god into an even smaller box, and made believers look even more foolish.
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No, you have what you believe. I have what I can prove.
This is why so many religious people are worthy of nothing more than the pity of rational humans. Contempt and disgust are also options, when religious fanatics engage in the kind of dishonest nonsense that seems to be your meat and bread.
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And what can you "prove"?
And do be aware that for anyone but an utter neophyte on the subject, nothing is "provable" outside of mathematics.
As I'm sure you have the typical profound ignorance of science as the one domain you can even poseur having worthwhile understanding of, typical of those with your worldview, understand that a "theory" is indeed just that. A provisional model permanently open to revision based on new evidence.
Show me what you can "prove".
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Do you speak English? Clearly you don't write it very well. No doubt this is part-and-parcel with your inability to understand science, mathematics or just about anything else having to do with rational thought.
Just for starters, you might want to review your understanding of the word "theory" as it applies to science. And poseur is a noun, not a verb, moron.
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So, nothing you claim you can "prove". Nothing citing where I've exhibited any dishonesty whatsoever. Just empty claims of my lack of understanding of science or "rational thought". I assure you, as a professional software developer, I demonstrate my understanding of both daily. Your parroted overextension of the domains to which "proof" applies, though, is neither novel nor scientifically sound.
Any time you want to back up anything you've said, feel free. It's optional for now.
And no, your inability t
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A "professional software developer"???
ROFL
Yeah, that makes you a real, live scientist.
And I've forgotten more about language than you'll ever know. What you attempt to define as "informal usage", rational people call "blatant inaccuracy for the purpose of misdirection".
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In other words, you finally figured out that your attempt at an argument is stupid, illogical and dishonest.
Like you.
Thus, your attempt to label me a troll.
Nice try. And Bravo for replying as an AC, as though your manner of expression isn't recognizable. Like so many religious types, you remain your dedication to lies and deception right to the end.
Never mind pity. You have earned my disgust.
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Your opinion on me or the topics you presume to address, cluelessly, means nothing, and has no effect anywhere other than as a typical time-wasting internet troll. Obviously, and even you are not too stupid to know this clearly while you state otherwise, I was posting AC due to device convenience, and absoluely obviously not an attempt to conceal who was responding.
Your goalless, pointless trolling cannot mean anything or have any consequence, even theoretically. According to either of our worldviews. If
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"I was posting AC due to device convenience, and absoluely obviously not an attempt to conceal who was responding."
Yes, of course. A soi disant "professional software developer" with a "device inconvenience", not a religious fanatic with a penchant for deception. No doubt you're also a chemist...one who's never heard of the Periodic Table.
"Lie on about my dishonesty you've yet to cite a single example of.
See above. Who are you going to sign in as next time? Jesus? Mother Teresa?
What you really are
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Your failure to address your dishonesty speaks louder than any words.
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There is no dishonesty, and you know it, idiot.
It's natural, and you're already clear that it's to absolutely everyone's benefit. Let evolution work. Soon.
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Rights come from the responsibility of an individual to support himself, and from the type of beings that we are (who use our rational faculty to consciously direct our lives.) There is also an element of rights that identifies rights-holders as "being on our team", i.e. not destroying humans and not being utterly alien. (We can deal with the Jell-o creatures from Zorblatz-7 some other time, that's not the issue here.)
Your vegetarian bias is just silly.
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Only if the resulting creation actually seems to exhibit a sufficient number of traits that are distinctly human-like. Does a synthetic person have a theory of mind once they get old enough? Can they question the universe around them and tr
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I don't think right to lifers are shy about talking about religion, where do you get that? The idea of human life being "sacred" -- a religious term, meaning set apart/dedicated to God -- is common in the movement. As to whether or not it is possible to create "synthetic" life, I would point out that it that isn't at all what is being discussed here. What the scientists will be doing is more like "directed" life, using the framework of existing biological systems to manipulate and direct growth. Manipulatin
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And all this time I thought that the scientist's parents created the scientist. Freakin' biology class! Nothing but a pack of lies!
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Congratulations. You get an A+ for sophistry. They most certainly argue that their efforts aren't based in religion...because then they'd have to watch out about mixing church and state, and maybe getting their freeloading asses taxed.
Amazing how many of Right to Lifers are in favour of capital punishment, though.
And unless you can come up with some concrete proof that god even exists, insisting he made anything at all is simply ridiculous.
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HEY! That's marvelous. They're going to create a human without original sin! And therefore no need for salvation.
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HEY! That's marvelous. They're going to create a human without original sin! And therefore no need for salvation.
Not thinking forwards enough. Artificial person; no parents; no inheritance; another damn welfare brat!!! President Trump, outlaw this!!
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Well played, sir. Well played indeed!
If I was allowed to give mod points on a thread I posted in, I'd give one to you...more if I could get away with it.
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The Right To Life types will go absolutely berserk over this. The whole religious underpinning of the movement...the one they never like to talk about...will have to decide whether a human created by man should enjoy the same protection as a human created by their god.
And when there's no sperm and egg union to enshrine as the moment when life begins, where will they draw the line? At what point during the assembly process does the thing in the dish deserve to be called human? A chimp shares all but 4% of our DNA, after all.
This should be fun!
As Dr. Frankenstein said to Igor, "If this thing works we won't need women any more".
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Umnh...they're just talking about building DNA strands here.
If they tried to do that this decade they'd just end up with a mess. And mitochondria should be easier to synthesize than a complete genome. (Admittedly, even that's beyond current state of the art.)
When they first do this it will be for something economically important. Cows, sheep, chickens, fish, soybeans, something. Plants are a bit tricky, but they tolerate small changes well. And they're easy to clone. People are tricky...in fact primat
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I agree with you, but I think it will prove to be easier than you believe. They've already sequenced the genome of a lot of mammals, and that's a long first step.
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At best it might be a brain dead shell, but most likely they will find that there is something quintessential about life that will prevent a truely synthetic organism from ever having that "spark" we call life.
Cool, I saw that movie too, bro.
OTOH, if nature can do it via evolution, nature can do it via human bioengineering.
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At best it might be a brain dead shell, but most likely they will find that there is something quintessential about life that will prevent a truely synthetic organism from ever having that "spark" we call life.
Cool, I saw that movie too, bro. OTOH, if nature can do it via evolution, nature can do it via human bioengineering.
Gonna change the nature of biology graduate school, totally.
Patents (Score:1)
The best thing about synthetic genes is that they're patentable, unlike naturally occurring genes. I, for one, welcome our gene synthesizing corporate overlords.
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Good (Score:1)
HIP (Score:1)
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IIRC, the Instrumentality didn't begin with the creation of the under-people, though I'm not sure. Wasn't the Instrumentality a part of "The Game of Rat and Dragon" or "The Lady Who Sailed the Soul"? (Admittedly they both have sort of proto-underpeople.) Or possibly "Mark Elf", though they could have existed without being visible in that one, and it's really out of the straight line history, as normal humans had nearly disappeared.
I was there... (Score:5, Funny)
and I can confirm the meeting was held at a secret base, located underneath a volcano.
Prior Art (Score:3)
Fifth Element did it! [wordpress.com] /SouthParkReference
Secret? (Score:2)
Scientists. (Score:2)
Scientists Hold A Secret Meeting
This is the first hint that perhaps your research will not pass the ethics committee review.
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That was the "ethics review committee". It actually had a number of ethicists in it. (Why is Firefox trying to change this to 'theists'? Does it know something?)
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More like the first hint that some asshole decided to write a sensationalist headline and misrepresent anything that might have actually transpired, so at most I'd be willing to take from anything they wrote would be 'some people met to discuss genetics'
Private vs. Secret (Score:2)
Those sneaky scientists! (Score:2)
They're always up to something weird!
I'm going to tell my kid to stay away from science and become a lawyer.
Headline grabbing? (Score:2)
Why would you give your meeting a "headline grabbing" (but supposedly inaccurate) title, and then ban the press from attending? Why manipulate the title for the sake of sensationalism, and then keep it all secret?
Someone is lying about something, I just can't tell which part is the lie. Are they lying about the title change? Are they lying about the true purpose of the meeting? Did the press lie about not being invited? When you have multiple "facts" that contradict each other, it's a sure sign that someth
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That's only one possibility. Another is that there were different small groups setting things up, and they weren't communicating very well. So when everyone got together a lot of things got changed.
OTOH, they did leave the name starting with HG... (They should have changed it to be "Huge Genome..." if they wanted to keep the initials.
Certain failure (Score:2)
Creating a human from all synthetic DNA would be a certain failure.
There are huge parts of the genome we do not fully understand. For instance we have ancient viruses incorporated in an harmless form. Removing that sequences cause vulnerability more diseases [slashdot.org].
The synthetic human will quickly die from a random disease that everyone else can cope with.
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There must have been one of their kind in the group since this secret meeting was exposed.
Sure. The "secret" meeting that was designed to be "headline-grabbing". Whatever.
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I do doubt that he made it "secret" though specifically to make it more headline grabbing. I expect he made it closed so it woudln't be pub
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So if we make a Claude Van Damme to belt ISIS, they're okay with it, but not if it's gay, brown, Muslim, from NY, and/or has no birth certificate?
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Well, the closest thing to it that Wikipedia is that he's bi-polar. Does that count?
Even better; imagine a genetically engineered Jean Claude Van Damme bipolar bear! Awesome!
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Republicans hate science unless it can be used as a weapon.
Corollary: you can use anything as a weapon if you try hard enough.
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Looks like Hillary's paid internet trolls [thedailybeast.com] are still at it.
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Re: This will piss off the republicans! (Score:5, Insightful)
Their kind hates science.
That's why all the people protesting nuclear projects, genetic engineering, and mountaintop telescopes are wearing business suits.
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summer humans
Oh, my sweet summer child...
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Ah, but which version? My favorite, I must admit, is C'Mell.
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Take note of it.
YOU live in the age that will see the first bronie fuck a lab created MLP life form.
and it will be an artificial white rat.