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Medicine Science

Scientists Call For Global Moratorium On Gene Editing of Embryos (theguardian.com) 111

Posted by BeauHD from the call-to-action dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Leading scientists have called for a global moratorium on the use of powerful DNA editing tools to make genetically modified children. The move is intended to send a clear signal to maverick researchers, and the scientific community more broadly, that any attempt to rewrite the DNA of sperm, eggs or embryos destined for live births is not acceptable. Beyond a formal freeze on any such work, the experts want countries to register and declare any plans that scientists may put forward in the future, and have these discussed through an international body, potentially run by the World Health Organization. Alongside technical debates about the possible benefits of creating genetically modified babies, the scientists said no decisions should be made to go ahead without broad public support. Eric Lander, founding director of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard in Cambridge, Massachusetts, calls for the moratorium with 16 other experts in the journal Nature. Emmanuelle Charpentier and Feng Zhang, who helped discover and develop the most common gene editing tool, CRISPR, contributed to the article.

The call comes four months after Chinese researcher He Jiankui used human embryos modified with CRISPR to create twin girls resistant to HIV.
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Scientists Call For Global Moratorium On Gene Editing of Embryos More

Scientists Call For Global Moratorium On Gene Editing of Embryos

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  • Yea Right! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by oldgraybeard ( 2939809 ) on Friday March 15, 2019 @10:35PM (#58282118)
    Those with the money will do it no matter what. Enhanced humans are a future given.

    Just my 2 cents ;)

    • Re:Yea Right! (Score:4, Interesting)

      by alvinrod ( 889928 ) on Friday March 15, 2019 @10:48PM (#58282152)
      Yeah, but it's genetics. They'll filter out to the rest of humanity over time as well. Unless they alter themselves to the extent that they're a different species.

    • Those with the money will do it no matter what. Enhanced humans are a future given.

      Just my 2 cents ;)

      Eventually, but the tech isn't ready yet, so we might as well buy ourselves a bit more time to figure out how to deal with it.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by dcw3 ( 649211 )

        The tech isn't ready? What do you think just happened here?

        "The call comes four months after Chinese researcher He Jiankui used human embryos modified with CRISPR to create twin girls resistant to HIV."

      • Eventually, but the tech isn't ready yet, so we might as well buy ourselves a bit more time to figure out how to deal with it.

        Let's hope that this is the only motive for this moratorium.

    • Yup (Score:5, Interesting)

      by rsmith-mac ( 639075 ) on Friday March 15, 2019 @11:03PM (#58282196)

      I'd mod you up if I could. The individual and collective rewards for gene editing are far too great to ignore. Someone (or likely many someones) will do it, even with the risks.

      Anyone who voluntarily follows this moratorium is, by definition, going to fall behind on the genetic arms race. And falling behind means that your society will eventually become the genetically inferior one.

    • oldgraybeard said

      Those with the money will do it no matter what. Enhanced humans are a future given.

      Just my 2 cents ;)

      I take it you've read "Homo Deus" by Yuval Noah Harari. That's its main point.

      Bet the DOD is funding such genetic engineering research now. They're famous for funding biological and medical research. What really scares me is how they might apply genetic editing. Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas, Epsilons, then me. "How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world, That has such people in't!" - The Tempest, by Wm Shakespeare (with an obvious reference to Aldous Huxley.)

    • Leading scientists have called for a global moratorium on the use of powerful DNA editing tools to make genetically modified children. The move is intended to send a clear signal to maverick researchers, and the scientific community more broadly, that any attempt to rewrite the DNA of sperm, eggs or embryos destined for live births is not acceptable.

      All this will do is create a(nother) black market. Just as the "war on drugs" and "war on prostitution" have done, and for exactly the same reasons: This is som

  • No arguments here (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Friday March 15, 2019 @10:37PM (#58282124)
    at least, not unless there's a health issue involved. There's a couple genes that cause childhood leukemia and if that can be edited out go for it. But we're not ready to start making super babies. Not that I don't think we should. Of course we should. But we need a _much_ better understanding of the long term effects before we do. The best way to find that out would be trying to fix the sick.
    • Why not just test it out with rats first? Set up a secret project in the labs at the National Institute of Mental Health and see how it turns out.

      • I'm thinking of a project involving a genetically enhanced organism, supplementing it with access to an implantable artificial intelligence, and since it's NIMH, have it start questioning the nature of mental health and sanity, giving up, and creating a networked cyborg intelligence that tries to take over the world.

        Or maybe I'm thinking of the sequel. Either way, I say go for it.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by quenda ( 644621 )

      There's a couple genes that cause childhood leukemia and if that can be edited out go for it.

      You don't need gene editing for that, just embryonic screening, which is much easier.
      Gene editing is for adding new gene variants. It could be the great equaliser, allowing everyone to have smart, healthy babies.
      No longer will your children's achievement be limited by the quality of your own genes.
      This could be good, or lead to the collapse of civilisation.

    • Might I oint out that genetic editing is already in progress, by performing testing of fetuses for their gender and aborting females? The over-population of young men in China is a predictable and not well managed result. The unforeseen consequences of more direct editing are an understandable concern.

      • which according to some economist and demographers may cause China a world of grief in a generation or two. Possibly sending them down the same demographic spiral as Japan/Russia/Italy/Germany. Hindsight is 20/20...

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dcw3 ( 649211 )

        And what makes you think there wouldn't be an even larger population if China had not? I'm not advocating it, I'm merely pointing out that with more females, you'd have an even larger population of both.

  • There is one simple fact to consider here; and, it's best to consider its ramifications when or if trying to render something illegal so it won't be done where you control life and liberty of others. "If something is technologically possible to do and there is a market for doing it, then it WILL get done at least one somewhere by at least one somebody." All making it illegal means is that when it is done you end up with a technological deficit, the technological mookie end of the stick.
    {^_^}

  • "Broad public support? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by gweihir ( 88907 ) on Saturday March 16, 2019 @12:30AM (#58282400)

    That is even worse than decision by committee. This is decision by uninformed masses that have no clue how things work and what is and is not important.

    While I am all for moving forward with extremely care in this area, letting the public decide about it is the worst idea possible. They will either be panicked irrationally or overoptimistic just as irrationally. Not good at all.

  • Imagine how wonderful it would be if a family that had been 100% black for five or six generations could produce a child who physically appeared to be 100% white. It would be fun to watch all the racists try to find some kind of test to figure out who was a "real" white person and who was just a pale imitation.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mentil ( 1748130 )

      who was just a pale imitation.

      ISWYDT
      Seriously, they'd use the standard "just one drop" [wikipedia.org] test.

      • Sadly, you're probably right. And thanks.

        • With "reparations" making a comeback in the democrat party, that may become a serious issue. How many "white" people have an ancestor that is "black"? I've got one that came from the slave coast of Africa...pretty sure how that one came over here (some of my ancestors sold some of my other ancestors into slavery). So, how do we determine who is black and who is white anyway? As far as I'm concerned I'm just human....breeds are for dogs. Why can't we just drop it?

    • At that point, would they even care if they couldn't visually tell the difference?

  • yes lets never improve ourselves (Score:3)

    by 0111 1110 ( 518466 ) on Saturday March 16, 2019 @12:47AM (#58282448)

    We aren't evolving anymore or if we are it is not for the better (see Idiocracy), but god forbid we should try to improve ourselves as a species. Boy wouldn't that be awful. It is too bad that only a tiny percentage of the human population is intelligent and the rest are total retards who are against any sort of change. Just imagine if we could give every baby an IQ of 150 or even 180, but most people would regard that as a horrific dystopia I guess. Totally sad that these people call themselves 'scientists'. This is anti-science.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mentil ( 1748130 )

      If the plebeians are able to pull themselves out of the genetic gutter, then who are the bourgeois going to systematically oppress? They won't want their children to have more mate competition at the genetic high-end, either.

      • The proletariat will forever be ruled because they ask to be ruled. They do not understand that the creation of governments of man is the creation of bourgeois itself. Any attempt to enlighten them is visited with derision and accusations of anarchy.

        Anarchy and Government are not polar opposites, they can quite readily be had together or apart, neither cares about the presence of the other and often times a bend too far in either of their directions strengthen the desire for the other.

        The folks espousing

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by fenrif ( 991024 )
          "Anarchy and Government are not polar opposites" Government Pronunciation /vm()nt//v()nm()nt/ noun 1treated as singular or plural The group of people with the authority to govern a country or state; a particular ministry in office. ‘the government's economic record’ ‘successive Labour governments’ 1.1mass noun The system by which a state or community is governed. ‘a democratic form of government’ 1.2mass noun The action or manner of controlling or

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by dcw3 ( 649211 )

          You lost me at "proletariat". You come off sounding like you're trying to be Lenin, and failing miserably.

    • We aren't evolving anymore or if we are it is not for the better (see Idiocracy),

      The clear evidence that we aren't evolving for the better is the people are using comedy shows as support for their ideas. Don't you have anything better than that?

    • Mathematically impossible. If every one had an IQ of "150", their IQ would by definition be "100".

  • So it's ok to gene edit fetuses or zygotes?

    I'm curious how the debate will shake out on whether these gene-edited girls should be allowed to reproduce. That debate WILL happen by the time they reach child-bearing age. IIRC it was a germ-line change.

  • Of course, we should be cautious, firstly, because we little understand how most human genes work and interact with each other and thus mistakes can screw up peoples' health. But it's actually a bad idea to rely on incompetent peoples' opinions. Other than that, I don't see anything wrong with the idea of enhancing ourselves in the genetic level. There are numerous diseases/disorders/weaknesses which are at least partially genetic. They have screwed up lives of tens if not hundreds of millions of people and [wasdarwinwrong.com]

  • And it is being used on individuals but not the germ line.

    It needs to move there, though. There are a number of rare genetic conditions we can edit out safely. We should do so.

    We don't know the genes for intelligence, it seems more complex than that anyway, so I'm not worried about that.

    Therapy should never be at family request but should have agreed life-or-death medical value as understood by genetic experts with no political or commercial links whatsoever.

    In other words, pharmaceutical companies, churche

  • They make it sound like there will be a strict control of gene editing of embryos, but what they will actually do is control who gets to do it and set up guidelines for actually doing it. Essentially they are just setting up the bureaucracy to do the thing, not forbid it. And scientists will just move out of their purview anyway. And if there is money in it - and of course there is - the whole system will become corrupted. In short, gene editing is here to stay and will grow greatly. So come the mutants.

  • ...all you like, but I really find it odd to see âoepowerfulâ and âoeDNA editing toolâ in the same sentence.

  • Not optional (Score:3)

    by r2kordmaa ( 1163933 ) on Saturday March 16, 2019 @02:12PM (#58284638)
    We are already screwing up our gene pool, sooner or later it will become a necessity to fix it. Consider for example cesarean section, what happened historically when a woman could not give live birth the natural way? Well, as sad as it is Darwin happened and genes that lead to this faulty morphology were removed from gene pool. Now medicine can bypass that particular selection pressure and the genes remain in circulation. That's the same for every life modern medicine saves prior to procreation. Give it enough generations and every life will start in an incubator with constant medical intervention for a lifetime just to not die. If fatal errors do not get removed by natural selection, then we need an artificial method to do it. It may not be an imminent concern, it's fine to wait on it for decades, but it's not wise to put a permanent moratorium on gene editing humans, because eventually we must do it.

  • Lets solve two problems at once (Score:3)

    by LesFerg ( 452838 ) on Sunday March 17, 2019 @12:48AM (#58286990) Homepage
    Why not edit up some babies that can digest plastic. Then let em loose in all those places that people are complaining about all the plastic pollution. Hell we wouldn't even need to educate them, just let em loose to eat and breed.

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