Genetically Engineered Children 482
A reader sent us a ABCNews story about the future of genetically engineered children. It's a bit fluffy, but creates some interesting questions, particularly in regards to the ethical questions. The synopsis of some of the people quoted is that most parents will actually do it, because they will want superior children. What do you folks think?
Yeah! (Score:1)
I would enhence thier spelling abilities, and
sences of humur.
parents do want superior children (Score:1)
Imperfections make the man...or woman... (Score:2)
Where would I be without my imperfections? I would be another boring person slogging away through this world, not standing out from the herd.
Where would I be if my parents had followed a course of genetically engineering their children? I would NOT be around because I am predisposed to being overweight, under-athletic, and have less-than-perfect vision despite having an excellent mind and capacity for learning and thought.
Where would YOU be under such a system? Probably non-existant.
I'm not arrogant enough to think that I would be perfect enough to slip through their filters, but I am arrogant enough to think that I deserve just as much right to exist as a "perfect" engineered alternative.
Scarey prospects indeed.
Let imperfections reign,
Jason
# Jason A. Dour
Running with the Herd (Score:1)
GATTAGA (Score:5)
If you've seen the movie, that's all I need to say to get my point across. For those that haven't, go see it right now - it was one of those pivotal sci fi movies you should have seen.
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Genetically Enhanced Hu,mpin' (Score:1)
:-)
Anyone ever read... (Score:1)
...Brave New World? That's what this reminds me of. The Alpha pluses, the Epsilons, the class divisions. I think this could either be very good or very bad. It could be very good and have the benefits of eliminating a lot of genetic based diseases, but it could also fragment the class and social structure with groups of "I'm better than your because they streamlined my chromosomes before I was born" type of ideaology. I personally already got enough of that type of crap in high school thanks....
Deitheres - Master of... er... something.
-- .sig files go when they die?
Child: Mommy, where do
Mother: HELL! Straight to hell!
I've never been the same since.
The Duties of the Parent (Score:2)
That being the case Parents would be remiss in their duties if they didn't at least consider genetic engineering. Their childs prosperity may depend on his or her advantages relative to their neighbours.
IMHO, of course.
J
Differnt strains of children? (Score:5)
One hundred years hence, race might have disappeared as the primary differentiation among persons. Instead, we may bear much more significant differences as the result of parental design.
Re:Genetically engineered mice (Score:1)
Why else would we be working ot make mice smarter or develop gene therapy for balding mice?
Steve M
Potential use of genetic alteration (Score:1)
of biotechnology will be to correct some of the more horrible genetic defects out there which prevent children from living long and happy lives -- cystic fibrosis, Tay-Sachs disease, that sort of thing -- NOT 'tuning' of intelligence or physical prowess. Technology exists now to discover the presence of some of these diseases before birth -- but so far no such genes for smarts or basketball have been discovered (and imho won't be). So don't think 'designer babies,' think 'healthy normal babies...' In the *far* future perhaps 'designer babies' will be possible but I think that's a lot longer down the road than most journalists appreciate.
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The ultimate results of mass genetic engineering? (Score:1)
//rdj
My $0.02 (Score:1)
1. People would suddenly lose individuality and personal character. If this kind of technology became available, there would be a sudden change. Everyone would want the opportunity for their kids.
2. I'm weary about having kids that are exponentially smarter than me. Although it might be cool.....
"Hey! Meet my kids! This is my son, Darryl, 4 years old, a Solaris/Linux sysadmin... my other son Darryl, 2.5 years old, a biochemist with a keen interest in group theory... and our daughter, Lucy, 6 months old.... she dreams in German."
See,ms like a good idea... (Score:2)
Not within our lifetimes. (Score:2)
No extrapolate that to babies: in order to produce genemod humans you need empirical data which you can't obtain without (for now) ghastly research. In order to break this cycle, first you have to watch Dolly (her telomeres are out of whack), then get a reliable method for making Dolly's (without the telomere problem), then move up to primates, and only when you can reliably produce genemod apes, can you even think about working on humans.
I doubt I'll live to see this. Even if I do, by the time anyone's ready to try it we'll have a good enough understanding of the genome that it won't be done for frivolous reasons. (crosses fingers)
Eugenics is nothing new... (Score:1)
And don't forget that people have been practicing artificial selection without the aid of a genome map for our entire existance as a species. People attempt to choose the best -- healthy, wealthy, intelligent -- partner to mate with. And on the more morbid side, there are dozens of cultures where female babies (or twins, or babies with birth defects) are killed because they are unwanted. The genome map will accelerate the trend towards eugenics, but it's not like we're moving from a society where no one cares about the fitness of their children to Brave New World.
think of the implications... (Score:1)
The old dilemma... (Score:1)
do I do what is best for my children, or do I do what is best for wider society ? In the UK, many people feel that a private education is superior to the one provided by the state; if this is so, do I send my kids to a private school, thus weakening the state school system, or do I send them to the allegedly inferior state school ?
The same is to an extent true with genetic engineering of kids - I believe it is not a good thing in the long term, except in certain rare medical situations; I believe society is served by having individuals who are not "perfect" - a world of Pamela Anderson/Harrison Ford clones would be dreadful. Would I choose a genetic improvement to my childrens' intelligence ? Well, maybe, if I could ever work out what intelligence really means. Was Picasso more or less "intelligent" than Einstein ? Would the world be served by a population made up entirely of succesful intellects - 6 billion Bill Gateses - aargh.
Scary. No answers, only questions; however, the really important thing is that we need to keep the science going forward, not run away saying "No, we don't understand this, we should not be researching this subject".
Maybe I read too much Vonnegut and Huxley (Score:3)
I'm reminded of the scenarios in Player Piano and Brave New World, which do a rather nice job of pointing out the major logistical problem with all this: Someone still has to do the grunt work. As it is, we aren't too far off of Vonnegut's scenario of female PhD's in cutthroat competition for secretarial jobs, and a genetically-engineered meritocracy is only going to aggravate the problem. There will still need to be a "producer" class, which is something that people tend to forget, and in this day and age of cheap mass-market goods made by little kids in China, most people don't want (even if they can afford it) to pay good money for the honest labor of a talented craftsperson. Think of how much less clothing the average person owned when it was usually sewn by someone in the household (by hand even), and how much less than THAT the average person owned when cloth had to be hand-spun and woven as well. Machines DO take care of some of this, but people still must run the machines.
There's also the small matter of the likely high correlation between intelligence and insanity. Remember the "Eve" episode of the X-Files? This holds fairly true in my own life
Trying too hard to "fix" a perceived problem tends to lead to backlash of some sort -- disease-resistant bacteria, anyone? There are two ways this could go, and I don't much care for either of them: An "all the children are above average" scenario, with "deviations" such as CP, Down's Syndrome, or perhaps even homosexuality ruthlessly stomped out, and people becoming ridiculously overqualified for even the most basic jobs; or a *deliberate* system of "breeding" a worker class (either human or AI). Gives me the creeps
Unlikely. (Score:2)
I disagree.
People are presently making an incredible amount of fuss over genetically modified food. A lot of this is down to ignorance and hyperbole (one woman was quoted as saying "I don`t want my food to have any of that DNA in it"); nevertheless, it shows that people are, to some extent justifiably, chary of new genetic technology, especially insofar as it has anything to do with them. If they`re making this much of a fuss about soya and tomatoes, how much more are they going to reject trying anything that sounds remotely similar on their own children?
Re: GATTAGA (Score:1)
Anyway, yes, I agree..definitely one of the "pivotal" sci fi flicks of the decade. Very powerful...I do believe you left out an important point . The scene where Vincent's parents are planning for their child.
They basically go to a clinic, and based on samples both parents gave, egg and sperm are screened and picked to give the best possible child. This is becoming more and more possible as time goes on and genetic engineering advances. Personally I don't see a whole lot wrong with this..If we possess the technology to decrease the likelihood of diseases and disorders, go for it.
However, I would have a _serious_ problem with people trying to decide what is best for me or society based on my genes, as it is presented in the movie. I don't think this technology will ever exist .
The scary part is...if it does exist, it will be used. That's where the queasiness comes in. It doesn't matter whether I have a problem with "genetically engineered children." What matters is that if the technology exists, it will be used. Pure science has never asked why. I can't think of a single technology that has ever been developed but didn't come into use for ethical reasons.
Anyway, you all get the idea, so I'll shut my hole now. Just...be wary and skeptical, but don't attack something without stopping to think about it first.
Fix problems, yes. Superior children, no. (Score:3)
I don't think creating superior children is a good thing, though. We might end up creating monsters that want to do away with all of those who aren't genetically superior. (At least it happens in that way in the sci-fi books
In fact, he says, it will be so beneficial that governments may require children to be engineered genetically to prevent development of new socioeconomic gaps.
I think this would be very wrong. if this happens here, I'm moving to another planet.
By the time these "smart" babies are born, they could be taught via direct transmission of electrical impulses into chips implanted in their brains.
"You might download French into the 3-year-old's brain directly," Caplan says.
Now, I'm wondering, did this really fit into the article at all? They were talking about genetic engineering, not implanted chips. They've gone from genetic engineering to cyborgs. (Personally, I'd want to be a cyborg, so it wouldn't be fair:) Plus, it's *upload* not download. Download is a transmission to you, upload is a transmission from you. Sigh. Net commercialization has corrupted the terms brought about by the old BBSes. Anyway, I'm finished rambling.
Hey, you took three cents!
vision correction (Score:2)
Now there's a fine line between that and controlling cosmetic features (hair/eye color) and personality features. And sometimes it gets very blury--is the tendency to be alcoholic a disorder that should be fixed or a personality trait?
And I'm sure governments around the world will react with fear and ban all human genetic alterations, dooming us to added generations plagued with poor vision.
Re:Imperfections make the man...or woman... (Score:1)
I don't remember the article making any claims that non-engineered people would not be allowed to exist anymore, so that's kind of irrelevant.
And when you talk about how the imperfections make things so much more interesting, you sound like you're suggesting that we shouldn't even mess with our children's genetics.
Try telling someone with a genetic disease, or a genetic learning disability, that it's better that they have those problems. That we shouldn't try and do anything about them because they "add character and flavor".
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Re:Differnt strains of children? (Score:2)
End result? Stupid people keep getting stupider, and smart people keep getting smarter.. instead of the other way around - ie, stupid people get smarter with each generation, along with the "already" smart ones.
Wonderful.. talk about THE crisis of mankind...
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Re:Further separate the rich from poor (Score:1)
What do ethics have to do with this ? (Score:1)
Not a good idea... (Score:1)
The haves vs. the have-nots (Score:1)
Think about it: the haves already send their children to better school which then gives them better educations-> better jobs-> better lifestyles. The rich will be the first and only (for a long, long time) to be able to afford pre-birth genetic recontruction. They choose to have children that are better, faster, smarter, and stronger. They literally evolve past us 'normal' humans because they have the means and we do not.
Survival not of the fittest.. but of the richest.
Ethics will play less and less into real life as economics takes over.
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Re:Running with the Herd (Score:1)
There has to be some form of governmental intervention with regards to genetic engineering of children.
If we allow it to run in the usual capitalism-driven system, where only those who can afford it can have it, it won't take long before we develop two distinct genetic classes - the upper class, which has genetically enhanced themselves, and the lower class, which no longer has the abilities to compete.
Do we really want to divide ourselves into two distinct species over time? I don't, and I suspect there are plenty of others who don't want to either. Which means we can't allow money to dictate who has access.
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spelling correction (Score:1)
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Re:Anyone ever read... (Score:2)
I recommend this book to anyone I can. It is a very entertaining read, and addresses the issues of genetic engineering and how society views outcats. What's more, it's funny!
READ IT [amazon.com] if you have a few free hours (it's pretty short).
Re:parents do want superior children (Score:2)
You seem to miss an important point - when a child is engineered, it is not entirely his parents' genes that are being propagated! Rather, it is the genes of those who donated the reference samples for ``big'', ``small'', ``red hair'', ``high intelligence'', etcetera. While it does not seem probable (well, to me this morning) that a large fraction of a person's genome would be selected by his parents (why mess with all the liver genes if they will work?), the few chosen traits that make him successful and healthy will not come from his parents at all. In the future, the most important determinants of who you are might not be your parents' genes at all!
Of course, once we start engineering genes rather than just copying them from other humans, then no one would be increasing their Darwinian fitness; engineered humans would be the Darwinian offspring of no one, but rather products of technology and mind working directly upon biological material.
We won't end up with "superhumans"... (Score:2)
The =last= thing most parents want is for their kids to be smarter, faster, stronger, more dexterous than they are. Even the best of parents don't want kids who have the mental or physical ability to run circles around them. The =average= parent =WANTS= to be superior to their kids, though. Look around you, and you'll see that that is where most of their self-esteem comes from.
Now, kids born in military bases are another matter. There, there is a strong incentive to produce "ultimate" warriors - brainless thugs. Again, though, the better they engineer them, the less control the "non-engineered" parents and military have, by definition.
I think what we'll see is less a dangerous swing towards creating dangerous superhumans, but more the destruction of intelligence and creativity. THESE are the traits most teachers and parents hate, and make someone "abnormal" or a "freak". THESE are what will go first. THEN we'll see the wholesale destruction of evolutionary shifts. If nature finds trait X to give someone an advantage, then the surrounding people will decide it makes the person "different" - a characteristic that will be stomped on, at all costs.
Eugenic Wars are a very real possibility, with each culture "purifying" it's new generation, making them gray, moronic, inferior clones of their "perfect" parents or the "perfect" society.
Re:Differnt strains of children? (Score:1)
The full potential horror that's available with this kind of idea is probably more than we can imagine. Think about children who have been designed to enjoy (ahem) "being with" pedophiles... wouldn't it be tempting to society to provide the pervs with ready-made victims, to keep the "real" children safe? Will there be kids designed to like crawling around in small dark places... perfect for coal mining, eh? The perfect part is, you can design beings that have few if any recognized rights (in the US at least) for the first 18 years of their existance. Oh, there's a thought -- design them for a life expectancy of 16 years, to avoid potential lawsuits when they hit majority age.
This issue goes far beyond what loving parents would want for their children. Sends shivers up my spine, it does...
Would I do it? In a heartbeat. (Score:1)
As for "improvements", the issue becomes more sticky. But I think in most cases the parents would be willing to give their children any advantage possible. Look at the prolifieration of all the products that will make your child learn more. Do you think parents wouldn't cut and paste a few genes if they thought it would turn their kid from average to Einstein, or from disabled to Carl Lewis? Many parents will do nearly anything for the good of their children. I don't think a little gene alteration would be beyond most.
Sure there are risks, but what's life without risks?
Re:Unlikely. (Score:1)
Other posters have already made reference to the 'Gattaca' storyline and Huxley's Brave New World. Implausible as they may seem now, we all know how quickly things change.
Re:Further separate the rich from poor (Score:1)
In this 19th century short story, a scientist travels to the future, and finds that the human species have split into two species: one evolved from the upper class, the other from the working class.
For a long time, this view seemed like an overly pessimistic extrapolation of the situation during the industrial revolution, but if the rich get the means to engineer their children, this might well happen.
On the other hand, how can you refuse parents the right to prevent passing on myopia, asthma and other hereditary ailments to their offspring, if the technology is there?
Re:The Duties of the Parent (Score:2)
There are enough schools of thought as far as parenting is concerned as it is, some of which are wildly contradictory, and IMHO any ONE of them taken to an extreme is likely to produce a screwed-up kid or several. Now, they'll probably be screwed-up in different WAYS, but still they will have problems. It could be a stay-at-home mom who is reluctant to let "her little babies" out of her sight (even when said babies are teenagers), parents who drag kids to lesson after lesson rather than spending time with them, "accellerated preschools," and lots of other things I can't think of right now.
IMHO, it is the FIRST duty of the parent to let the child grow into an independent person, not an extension of the parent's ego. Living vicariously through one's kids may be common, but that doesn't make it morally acceptable.
Can you say ... (Score:1)
The really scary thing.... (Score:1)
Believe me, the world protrayed in Gattaca is a whole lot nicer to those with "inferior" DNA than the world we live in now.
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This is not the most scariest thing (Score:1)
Re:The Duties of the Parent (Score:1)
Re:Differnt strains of children? (Score:2)
Re:Imperfections make the man...or woman... (Score:3)
I would only opt for this technology if I knew my wife or I carried a defective gene that could transmit a serious disease to my children. But the thought of designer children is reprehensible. Each of my three children is a unique individual with their strengths and weaknesses. It is the sum of our set of traits that make us individuals.
You only have to look at the monolith of popular culture with its winner take all approach to celebrity to predict where designer children lead
to. How many tall blond children with perfect teeth and the athletic abilities of Michael Jordan could the world stand?
Aside from the vapid uniformity of such a world there is the serious question of loss of genetic diversity. We are already seeing this in the agriculture industry with every farmer wanting to grow the most profitable strain of wheat or raise a herd of only the most prolific breed of milk producing cows. Extensive genetic engineering of children to culturally determined norms could lead to a world where a new disease, which today might only affect a fraction of the population, might threaten the extinction of the human race (not that it would be much of a loss by that stage).
Another troubling vision is corporate ownership of genetic traits. We already have patented lifeforms and crops genetically engineered by company A to only thrive with company A's fertilizers and herbicides. Will "trait agencies" spring up to buy the genetic information from individuals with outstanding abilities in some specific area like mathematics or athletics? If you have an un-engineered child with natural mathematical abilities could you be sued for fringing on that company's IP? Could parents be sued later in life by un-engineered children for disadvantaging them in the life competition for jobs and spouses? Would third world children be genetically engineered to resemble voluptuous movie stars for a life of slavery and prostitution. A scary world indeed!
It's time to set those alarm bells ringing (Score:2)
Man playing God have always been a bit of a touchy subject and I think with good reason.
DNA, Genetics and Cloning are issues that challenges our ideas of what make us human or what we really want humans to be. It seems sad that human values are derived from "success", namely status & wealth, in the rat race not merely for the sake of living. This attitude seems to be adopted by the bioethicist in the article. "In a competitive market society, people are going to want to give their kids an edge" So the point of life then is to have "an edge" over your competitors? So these children's lives are nothing more than beating and competing with the other robots that's going to come out of this? Maybe I'm a backward romantic on life but it would seem that it would be a wrong ideal to enforce on children.
Another problem I can see is the inevitable division of societies into the haves and the have nots. It will create an elitist society, differentiated by some pre-determined conditioning and genetic engineering, much like in Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World". The gaps in the wealthy and the poor will not only be entrenched by material wealth but physical superiority as well.
And not that pleasure in "doing" something isn't already hard enough to find. People used to be able to just enjoy the simple things in life, like fixing things that are broken, building that shed in the backyard. Now, the pressures of the rat-race would force most people to just hire in someone to do it for them. It would seem that in the future, no longer will you be able to enjoy the challenges of learning new things by yourself but you'll be able to download and know everything by the click of the button. But what bloody good is that? Sure no one likes exams and you always want to know more, but half the enjoyment is the sense of satisfaction that you have endured and achieved a particular thing. If all you ever wanted to know about everything can be downloaded in minutes- like downloading French as mentioned in the article- then what is there left for you to do?
Happiness is hard enough to find without all these distractions
Children are not like Cars... (Score:2)
Arthur Caplan quotes: "Absolutely, somewhere in the next millennium, making babies sexually will be rare..." -- If you ask me, he's nuts. Genetic engineering may be an alternative, but it'll never replace the "natural" way.
And the concept of microchips in the brain is really dumb...Sure it may provide the ability to imbue the entire UNIX manual into a 4 year old's brain, but there's no fun in that...tis better to spend time to learn by trial & error. Eh well, I won't be around when all this happens prolly anyways, cause it's still a good century down the road I think...*coughtechnologicaldarkagecough*
A penny for your thoughts, and I gave my two cents, now where is my change?
Have you seen any elm trees lately? (Score:2)
Researchers today are still looking for elm's that have a resistance to this disease (though I think they have a few likely trees).
How about getting breeding children without the gene for sickle cell anemia. Sounds like a marvelous idea, sickle cell being very destructive in Africa.
Except being a carrier apparently gives you some protection against malaria (iirc), which is why such a disease with a negative reproductive impact is still around.
Something that may be closer to many slashdot readers, myopia. Who wouldn't want to free theur children from the need to wear glasses? However, correlations have been found between myopia and intelligence. Is it because four-eyes like to read, or is there a genetic link between brain size and the size of the eyeball? If it comes down to an either or, do you pick between a brainy kid who may need glasses, or a less smart kid who doesn't?
My point, anything that reduces genetic diversity in a species puts that species that much closer to a catastrophic pandemic.
That said, I don't think this will be an issue by the time I procreate again, though I fear my daughter may have to make this choice.
George
Re:Imperfections make the man...or woman... (Score:2)
Genetic engineering BEFORE the fact has many more dangerous implications and is more ripe for abuse.
Are there terrible diseases and disorders that could be prevented and eradicated from the human genome? Probably.
Are we better off for doing it? Maybe.
Who draws the line as to what is beneficial via eradication and what is not?
Perhaps the gene for bipolar disorder could be eradicated, and thus many people would be saved the trial of living a life of highs and lows. But as a person who is mild bi-polar, I see that struggle as INTRINSIC to my personality and being.
Just as I forgo chemical mood alteration, I would definitely resist the temptation to genetically eradicate such an integral part of my person. My life, my art, my work -- they are all closely tied into who I am, and who I am is defined by all of my "normal" AND abnormal attributes.
Who draws that line? You? Me? Someone else? A committee? A government? A committee of governments? A convention of planetary diplomats? Who has the knowledge necessary to make such a sweeping and deeply altering decision?
I certainly hope you don't count yourself capable of such a decision...
Jason
# Jason A. Dour
Technofobic sci-fi aside, (Score:2)
This has nothing to do with "staying competitive". I certainly hope other parents will do the same, or better if they can afford it, as I do. My children will be better off if their contemporaries are better off. This is no different than education, I want my children to have the best possible education, but I also want them to live in a society where every child is offered good education.
Please note that most of technofobic sci-fi also predicts totalitarian states to keep their vision sufficiently dark. They are usually written by humanists, who feel the humans have reached perfection. Well, reading the newspaper I desperately hope that is not the case.
Do you want to get rid if myopia? (Score:2)
On the other hand, what if myopia and intelligence have a genetic link?
Mr 20-400 myself
George
Re:Have you seen any elm trees lately? (Score:2)
Something that may be closer to many slashdot readers, myopia. Who wouldn't want to free theur children from the need to wear glasses? However, correlations have been found between myopia and intelligence. Is it because four-eyes like to read, or is there a genetic link between brain size and the size of the eyeball? If it comes down to an either or, do you pick between a brainy kid who may need glasses, or a less smart kid who doesn't?
George, don't forget that there's also a very tight correlation between the length of a person's thumb and his/her measured intelligence on the Stanford-Binet! As a baby's thumb gets longer, the rest of him/her grows up, and as he reaches maturity his/her IQ peaks as well.
Not to pick at ya; just pointing out how careful you have to be with statistically based arguments.
The rich get richer, and... (Score:2)
The rich will then get richer, and better looking, and faster, and smarter, and anything they can afford.
When confronted with the fact that 'everybody is doing it', and the 'keeping up with the Joneses' mentality of the affluent sectors, there's not a question of if. With their considerable resources brought to bear on politicians (law makers), lobbyists (big-time funds), Universities (researchers), the rich will make certain that their children are better designed to run the world when their turn comes.
There is no doubt that there will be some stratification among these 'people'. There will be children specialising in sports, intelligence, comeliness, artistic talent... I'm sure mother nature will be vengeful, but nature is a whore and can be bought, or at least rented for a few generations.
There is no doubt about another thing either. This will be the playground of the rich. They will do what they can to keep it that way. After all, what right has a poor kid to measure up to out perfect little Johnny? Right?
Families will save for a gene-tweak as they now save for homes. They will not manage to do anything other than guarantee a kid free from birth defects. A kid who can earn a living.
The normal person will be the working stiff, while the enhanced homo neogeneticus will live a life of leisure and pleasure.
What do you think, fellow Morlocks?
Re:Further separate the rich from poor (Score:2)
In this 19th century short story, a scientist travels to the future, and finds that the human species have split into two species: one evolved from the upper class, the other from the working class.
For a long time, this view seemed like an overly pessimistic extrapolation of the situation during the industrial revolution, but if the rich get the means to engineer their children, this might well happen.
On the other hand, how can you refuse parents the right to prevent passing on myopia, asthma and other hereditary ailments to their offspring, if the technology is there?
Aaahhhh, here's an interesting point for you though, do you know which race was which?
As I recall the ones who lolled about in paradise, as dumb as dirt and frightened out of their minds of the 'other' race were the 'superior' race. While the true rulers were the 'workers' who lived under ground. The 'superior' folk were just parasites, and not even inconvenient parasites, they were just there. If we get much farther along I'm joining the working class, they tend to have the common sense.
Kintanon
Re:Imperfections make the man...or woman... (Score:2)
The parents.
You may love your diseases and minor handicaps, but I don't love mine. Given the choice, I'd rather not force them on my children.
Re:Maybe I read too much Vonnegut and Huxley (Score:2)
We're talking arbitrarily infinite knowledge here, in other words. At some unspecified point in time, humanity will have completely mapped out and understood the human genome, and that includes such things as linking factors between insanity, intelligence, obesity, laziness, athleticism, and so on. Given that arbitrary knowledge, not only can you install someone with any of those traits, but you can also unlink them with the negative factors.
How arbitrary "arbitrary" actually is, however, is the real crapshoot. How long until we possess enough knowledge that we can understand the interaction between genes? Mapping things out ("Hey, xy124ht controls I.Q.!") is going to be the easy part compared to trying to untangle the weave of interactions between genes.
Re:Maybe I read too much Vonnegut and Huxley (Score:2)
This is based in money and we all know it. The parents of the 90% of the children of the world that are born in third world countries will not have access to this technology. These children will wind up doing the labor for the elite offspring of the wealthy. Oh, wait, is this something new?
I have children -- I wouldn't do this to them for all the gold in Fort Knox, and I hope no one else will either (though I know they will if it ever becomes available).
Re:The end of sex? You must be kidding (Score:2)
Is intelligence a survival trait? (Score:2)
Controlling genetics has nothing to do with it. My other half has long argued that intelligence isn't a survival trait. Intelligent people are having less children than stupid people. Is this just an example of Darwinism in action? Is intelligence beneficial for the survival of the human race? Up to a certain point, yes, but you could argue that high intelligence is unnecessary, and in fact undesirable, for the continued existence of the human race. The race will last longer without it, albeit in a slightly more primitive manner. The only point at which this argument breaks down is when space travel becomes necessary for survival. Will the intelligence to do it have been bred out by then? Only time will tell...
Re:Some technologies are never used (Score:2)
Sooo.... Lobbing a disease ridden corpse over a castle wall with a catapult is NOT biological warfare? Biological weapons, chemical weapons, nuclear weapons, all have been employed throughout history in various forms. Just because we haven't dropped any out of an airplane doesn't mean people don't use them.
Kintanon
Re:GATTAGA (Score:2)
The second worst thing is: It might NOT happen. (Score:2)
The thing that a lot of posters in threads like this forget (on purpose?) is that this technology, like any other, is not in the hands of the state here. It is in the hands of parents-to-be. People select their kids' genes all the time. They do it mostly by mate selection and a few by sperm/egg donor, but everyone does it nevertheless. All the gene manipulators will do is expand the pool of choices. The dystopian aspects of GATTACA are due to an entirely separate possibility, and that is genetic discrimination; it's distinct from the ability to engineer genes. If we can outlaw discrimination on the basis of skin color and go as far as we have towards eradicating it, we can almost certainly keep discrimination on the basis of genes from going very far.
So what are we achieving here with gene selection for our kids? I think that what we're buying is health and vigor, and happiness to the extent that healthy and vigorous people are happier than those who are not. How can this be a bad thing?
--
Deja Moo: The feeling that
Re:Have you seen any elm trees lately? (Score:2)
But I thought it raised an interesting point.
George
Re:The way to stop it (Score:2)
To be blunt, people that have more than two children are selfish bastards. Maybe genetically-engineered children would obviate the "need" to have too many kids in the first place.
In many countries in the Western world, the birth rate is already below the needed replacement rate (which is, I believe, 2.1 children per couple in a first-world country with modern medicine). This is why the average age of the population is increasing, with all the concomitant problems of `Who`s going to pay for all those pensions then?`. If the trends continue this way, there will soon be coming a time when the majority of the population is over 50.
Yet at the same time, today the birth of the 6 billionth member of the current population was announced. Globally, the population is still increasing, although the growth of the acceleration is slowing (Yes, I got that right, it`s growth to the second power). This is because of the population growth in developing countries. And people there aren`t going to get their hands on Do-It-Yourself Genetic Engineering Kits any time soon, even if they were available here. What`s going to help them is simple, cheap things that are already readily available. Contraceptives. Education. Decent, simple healthcare. When people realise that they don`t have to have twelve kids any more in order for one of them to survive to care for them in old age, when people can get hold of, afford, and know how and why to use contraceptives, when prestige depends on your skills and knowledge rather than the number of sons you bear, and when they don`t have to have a dozen kids so they can send them all out to work to earn enough money to live off - that`s when we`ll see the world population going down again.
Do you remember the point? (Score:3)
Gattaca wasn't all bad, just really cheesy and simplistic. And the acting sucked, but that's a staple of sci-fi. Anyway...
At the end of the movie, remember when they were swimming like when they were kids, and they perfect brother lost to the bad one? Why did that happen?
Ever hear a Nature vs. Nurture debate? IMHO, you can't have one without the other. What does it matter if the you have the best genes if you grow up in a box? Or if you're beaten from a young age? What about if you go the natural process and have a full, loving, supporting environment? Who will come out on top? What happens continually to people who think they are better than others and are lazy, when they meet someone "inferior" who works harder?
Genes are only a starting place. The best genes in the world won't save you from a Mack truck or a
Regardless, whatever you call it the human spirit, the soul, desire, will. There is and always will be an intangible part of a being that is as important as the physical part.
Re:You wouldnt "do" what? (Score:2)
Since when is 'Thin' equal to 'Healthy'?! the current Supermodel look is about as healthy as a walking skeleton. Our societal concept of beauty is about 30 pounds under healthy. I weigh 120 lbs, my girlfriend weighs about 200, we're both 5'7, she just barely looks bigger than me. She's healthy. Some 5'10" 105lb model is NOT healthy... she's disgusting.
Kintanon
Re:Have we forgotten Huxley? (Score:2)
There is a hell of a lot more to Huxley's masterpiece: it's about a spiritual void, "everybody belongs to everybody else" social conditioning, and 'the savage' wanting to go back to more primative times in order to find a spiritual center. As a concrete example, the Savage's discovery of Shakespeare was an important part of the book, and it sure ain't about test tube babies.
A ton of English teachers all over the planet need to have their pay docked for misinterpreting Huxley's book. It's not another shallow "Upton Sinclair" type tome about the perils of test tube babies. It's more complex, with more themes, than a lot of Beta-minus English teachers (that's basically the kind of person who gets into the teaching profession, sadly) can even understand.
Go back and re-read it. It isn't that you have forgotten it, you never read it closely enough the first time.
Yellow Journalism (Score:2)
"Absolutely, somewhere in the next millennium, making babies sexually will be rare," Caplan speculates.
Oh yeah, who would want to have sex to make babies, what a silly thought.
"In a competitive market society, people are going to want to give their kids an edge," says the bioethicist.
Bioethicist? Freak-a-zoid is more like it. Hmmm how many people want to roll dice with their children's psyche? How many of those however many million genes do you have to screw up to get a psychopath? Do we have any idea? All of this stuff is still a long way off.
and finally, if you thought the reporter had some sense..
Who knows? Maybe all this technology will make humans so smart they'll be able to predict the future.
That's just silly. We can already predict the future, for a day or two. Beyond that things get ridiculous. Read some Chaos theory or go outside and feel a breeze or count to 6,000,000,000 (the number of people currently co-creating the future)
Silly article, but it makes for good discussion.:-)
hmm, maybe there will be a use for journalists in the future....
Re:Imperfections make the man...or woman... (Score:2)
I hate to be a spoiler here, but we humans (at least those in rich western nations) are already in the business of correcting our imperfections.
Where would I be with my imperfections?
- I would be unable to drive, unable to work almost, very limited in what I can do. I am both nearsighted and astigmatic. Both conditions corrected since the age of 4 or so, via glass then plastic lenses that were engineered for me by the optical technicians my parents and I hired.
- I would have severe dental problems, from crooked teeth to lost teeth, gum infections, etc. Instead, my teeth have been maintained constantly from an early age by dental technicians my parents and I hired.
- I would be dead, most likely, from a burst appendix at the age of 15. My parents hired a surgeon to intervene and remove the damn thing before it could get me.
Get a grip, people. Genetic engineering is a big step, yes, but engineering our bodies is nothing new. We do it all the time right now. At least, we rich westerners do... and you know what? We feel good about it! In fact, we have come to the point in most western countries where medical care, dental care, and vision correction are not even seen as luxuries, but rather, rights. (Again, for citizens only -- poor Mexicans don't have rights, do they? At least, not as good as our rights. At least, not it if means that I have to pay anything.)So, for those that want to be worried about genetic engineering: don't worry about whether or not it will happen -- it will, because we will want it desperately. Worry about the social effect that that desire will have. Such as, say, rounding up all the Mexicans, aetheists, drug-users, geeks, red-heads and other undesirables that are leeching on our God-given rights, and sending them back to where they belong. Don't think it can't happen here.
-Leonard
Re:Imperfections make the man...or woman... (Score:3)
About "unfit" parents. They are already a problem today. Fathers who rape their infant daugthers, mothers who nearly drown their children as a punishment, drug abusers who get children that are born addicted (and hiv-positive). This wont change, as today there will be limits to what parents are allowed to do to their children.
It seems that your most besic fear is from taking responsibility. By arguing that we should deny the right to choose a better life for our children to *everybody*, you assume that you yourself will not have to make the choice. While this is convenient, it is a lie. By denying it to everybody, you are also forcing a choice on your children.
In our society, the technology will be available to the rich first. You can argue about whether or not this is "fair" or not, but that is the result of living in a capitalist society. However, already today some people are healthier, stronger, and brigther than others, and these people are more often than not a worthy contribution to our society. The opposite viewpoint, that nobody can be healthier, stronger, or brigther than the medium is not a society I' want to live in.
Re:Fix problems, yes. Superior children, no. (Score:2)
Use objective arguments, please (Score:2)
Most arguments I've heard about this issue come down to two issues: fear and jealousy.
"People will get jealous because they didn't (get the opportunity to) take advantage of GE, and they'll revolt."
How is this any different than people being jealous that they didn't get higher education, or didn't have the wealth to get into a private school? Or, how is this different than countries being jealous that their histories didn't lead them to opulance and instead led them to poverty? This seems to me to be just like any other rich/poor scenario. And this is all perfectly natural. Agreed, it's best to structure things so that an action is persued in such a fashion to avoid conflict, but that doesn't mean that the action can't take place. This could be better phrased "There is danger that such technology could upset people, so care should be taken to avoid conflict, perhaps by offering it to everyone equally."
"A superhuman race will form, and the normals will be inferior."
Again, how is this bad? Those that have (or are perceived to have) better skills will get hired. Should it be any other way? Would you prefer that this "Superhuman" race would develop, and they wouldn't be treated any differently? Also, do you think that this "Superhuman" race hasn't already developed? If you believe in genetics, don't you believe that smart people usually reproduce with smart people, and that this race is already in existence? Likewise, we are already all judged by our ancestry in at least one area: health insurance. If people were truly as obsessed with genetics as Gattaca seemed to imply, people would request personal histories before hiring.
"From birth your destiny will be controlled by your genes."
The point is getting old, but this is already in effect. Your life is a direct result of how you were developed -- if your environment invested in your education, you became successful. If it didn't, you won't. Both your genes and your envirionment are mainly out of your control, and this will be the case with or without genetic engineering.
"This technology is so poorly understood, they could actually hurt themselves by doing it."
This is a good cautionary note, but again doesn't mean outright avoidance. If it does indeed turn out that GE actually weakens people (ie, causes degenerative damage, shortens lifespans, etc) then they took a risk that failed, so be it.
"This technology is so poorly understood, they could hurt me by doing it."
And this makes perfect sense. We don't know what kind of crap could happen. We could create some sort of bizarre virus that affects millions, or who knows. This is by far the best argument against it in my book, but sadly rarely comes up.
These are all interesting points, but most could be made about private schools, music tutors, and genetically engineered crops as well. Jealousy that you or your offspring won't be one of the "superior" race just doesn't to me seem a valid argument against something that could very well lead to stepping the net intelligence of humanity up a notch. Likewise fear that something Bad would happen with this technology can be offset by slow and cautious progress. Neither fear nor jealousy are objectively convincing arguments for why it shouldn't be done. And without objective arguments, it will be done. Perhaps not tomorrow, but a genetic superrace will develop in the near future. Perhaps it'll be called "genetic vaccinations" or "mental health augmentations" or whatever, but there will always be people that are exploiting risky and experimental medical treatments to attempt to better there lives. If you don't like it, figure out a way to eliminate the demand, and then the supply won't be an issue. If you can't figure out a way to convince people that they shouldn't want it, perhaps it is you that needs convincing.
Re:Lets be realistic here... (Score:2)
For instance: Say you're hiring for some position that requires intelligence. One applicant is genetically engineered to have an IQ of 200. The other is not genetically engineered and has an IQ of 150. Which would you hire? Sure, the non-genetically engineered applicant is about as smart as you're going to get naturally. That doesn't mean s/he is going to be able to compete with the genetically engineered applicant. Should the company be required to hire some set amount of non genetically engineered individuals (Affirmative Action in the 21st century...)? Is that really fair to the company?
This is entirely different from not hiring someone based on some genetic factor that doesn't effect performance, and, as people have already pointed out, that already happens.
Getting rid of genetic diseases would be great, yeah. But what qualifies as a genetic disease? Is my bad eyesight a genetic disease? My freckles? My skin color? (After all, these last two combined increase my risk of skin cancer!). How about depression? I'm pretty certain there's a genetic factor there, as my dad has many of the same symptoms. These are all things that could concievably be considered disorders that should be corrected for, but they also help define who I am (well, except the eyesight. Go ahead and fix that :).
Should a low IQ be corrected for? After all, that can severly effect a person's life. What do we do there? Bump them up to exactly average?
Yes, it would be great to correct for genetic disorders. Its just not that simple to decide what qualifies as something to be "fixed", and what doesn't. Or exactly what the result of this fix should be.
Re:vision correction (Score:2)
Also, I remember someone on slashdot saying that human blue receptors are sensitive far into the ultra-violet, it's just our lenses are uv-opaque, so they proposed uv-torches (i.e. "black-light" lamps, as used in discos) and artificial lenses for spies...
This brings up something interesting, I can see almost perfectly at night, just by the light of the stars even with no moon. But only WITHOUT my glasses... I've wondered if this were because the way my (nearsighted) eyes focus light allowed more of the light in the area to reach the lens. Oh, incidentally I have hazel (Brown/Green) eyes.
This is a huge plus to me since I hate working and being awake during the day, so I spend almost all of my time awake at night when I have a choice... Of course, the fact that I did the same throughout my childhood may have led my eyes to develop better night vision....?
Kintanon
Gattaca etc (Score:2)
Yes, the sheep will probably go for the genetic engineering. Anything they can get that means they can have better children without having to put any thought into it. Anything they can but to make their children better will go over big. It means the parents can produce better children without having to put any effort into being better parents. Most parents today are pretty sucky when it comes to raising kids (yeah its a generalisation, DWI). Adding genetic engineering of unborn children to the world will not make better people, just better DNA.
Probably the most disturbing thing about this, is how people don't stop to consider that nobody is perfect. The universe doesn't make perfect people, or perfect animals, or perfect viruses or perfect anythings. If we had genetic engineering 125 years ago, would we have had an Albert Einstein? How about Stephen Hawking? Granted, it might have been interesting to see what Hawking could do if he didn't have to live the way he does. But, would he still be the same man? If Einstein hadn't been told he was an idiot as a child, he might have gone on to a nice career as a engineer, or a doctor or lawyer, and might never have been working as a patent clerk.
I guess the point is this : If there are no obstacles to rise over, will anyone care to try harder, to do more?
Re:The second worst thing is: It might NOT happen. (Score:2)
Genetic engineering isn't like a prep-school education. It's a technical practice and lends itself to automation. You can expect the price to come down very rapidly with time, like gene-sequencing and computers. Ten years after the rich start using it, it'll be a middle-class thing. Ten years after that, everyone will use it if they can benefit from it.
And what will people use it for? I can see some working to keep some of the "disadvantageous" traits of their ancestors, but escape the consequences. For instance, modify the sickle-cell anemia gene so that homozygote embryos fail to develop. This keeps the heterozygote resistance to malaria but avoids the health impact of a child getting one gene too many. Sure wouldn't hurt!
--
Deja Moo: The feeling that
Re:Imperfections make the man...or woman... (Score:2)
Believe me, even those people born today with a perfect health find plenty of struggle in life. Our children will too, even if the struggle will be for reaching the stars, rather than getting up the stairs.
I know that we are imperfect, but that doesn't mean we can't hide from the hard decisions, such as whether we want to pass our health problems to our children.
And no, I don't think the human species is or will ever be perfect. But it is evolving, changing, and thus being real. I don't want it traped in a dead end due to a self-sufficient
cowardy.
Too optimistic (Score:2)
By the way, there doesn't seem to be much genetics in that article. I was kind of disappointed.
Anyway, sorry, I know this may sound a bit contrived, but given a lot of you are programmers out there, I thought I'd throw out this silly little analogy:
Think of the human genome as the binary code of a program. The human genome project is only going to give us a memory map, not the actual source code. Can you imagine trying to modify code without having the source? Maybe if you were a hard core machine language programmer--but what's worse is that we don't even know entirely how the CPU works (which in this analogy would be the laws of physics.) Add to this the fact that the extreme fragmentation of the code base--everyone of us is running an almost entirely unique version--and the idea that we can just go off and start modifying things easily seems really ludicrous.
Take, for example, the case of cystic fibrosis. On first glance, it may seem that we've figured out where the problem is: a gene in 7q31 that codes for what appears to be a chloride channel. Everyone who has CF has a problem with this gene. But guess what, we don't know what this gene does. We have ideas, after years and years of research, but we're not even sure if the gene product itself is what causes the disease, or if it's something else entirely. Notwithstanding the fact that we have the entire nucleotide sequence of this gene and most of its common polymorphisms. Replacing the gene in some people does work, but not for everyone. And we have no idea what it does to the stability of the genome if it were inserted into germ cells.
Or take Down's syndrome. The problem is very obvious--you have three copies of chromosome 21 instead of two. We don't need to know any sequence information to figure this out. But the thing is, even if you were to detect this in a fetus or even in a zygote, how are you going to get that extra copy out without destroying the zygote? It's not like we can tell which chromosome is which in vivo. I guess you'd have the option to abort--but that's nothing new.
Then there's the problem of passing these modified traits on. Even in really simple cells like yeast, although we can insert all sorts of DNA into it and get the cell to use it, we still can't get it to reliably pass it on to the next generation. While this is OK when you're just interested in making a protein, and a success rate of 1 for every million is actually pretty good, this would be insane in human beings. Sure, you've got a pretty smart and physically fit kid, but hey, you know what, he can't have any kids himself. Except you probably won't even get that far most of the time, since the zygote will probably fail to divide into viable progeny. I guess we'll have to try the next test tube. Genetic engineering in the fetus has the possibility of sterilizing us all. Even cloning is inexact--look at Dolly the Sheep.
While bacteria, plants, and fungi can stand all sorts of mangling of their DNA, that isn't the case for human beings. Even one slight change to the genome is likely to cause a miscarriage, often for reasons we don't understand--in a lot of them, there are no gross problems with the genome. Add to this the fact that most of the major conditions we'd be interested in are polygenic and multifactorial (meaning the environment has a big part in what happens)--like cancer and heart disease--and it's easy to see that the utility of genetic engineering is likely to be limited. I'm not saying it's useless-far from it, but it is hardly the paradigm shift that the article makes it out to be.
Re:Fix problems, yes. Superior children, no. (Score:2)
Ooh, I can imagine a great science fiction story where they genetically created superpeople are...
black!
I wonder how many parents would be itching to make their children more sunburn resistant and have better visual response if the genetic engineering made them look black?
It would sure make a strange scene at the country club.
George
Re:You wouldnt "do" what? (Score:3)
His point is still perfectly valid -- When we select mates, qualities we find physically attractive can always be attributed to some sort of positive genetic attribute.
The very fact that you find an extremely skinny girl unhealthy (thus unattractive) is a direct result of this, and illustrates his point perfectly.
Re:Maybe I read too much Vonnegut and Huxley (Score:2)
I know we can't be sure which of these scenarios (if either) is correct, but it'll be awfully hard to find out except by running the experiment.
--
Deja Moo: The feeling that
Philosophical Ramblings... (Score:2)
Where would I be if my parents had followed a course of genetically engineering their children? I would NOT be around because I am predisposed to being overweight, under-athletic, and have less-than-perfect vision despite having an excellent mind and capacity for learning and thought.
>>>
Yes, that embryo that became you would not exist. But in its place would be an individual without those physical imperfections but all the mental abilities, and guess what? That individual would be YOU!
I'm not advocating genetic engineering here. I just get tired of hearing that silly argument of if such-and-such never happened, I WOULDN'T BE HERE as if that would be a terrible tragedy.
Gee, if my father hadn't taken that trip to Boston in his twenties, he never would have met my mother, and I WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN BORN, thus I never would have had the social connections to get into Harvard, and I wouldn't be on this great promising political career with eventual presidential hopes, and... but wait, none of that happened! Instead, my father actually went to Asia, and met my mother, and I was born overseas, and thus I will never be the president, but I'm blessed with having two cultures, which never would have happened in the first scenario. So which is the greater tragedy/lost opportunity? There are an infinite number of potential scenarios, each centering on an individual who would be just as much YOU, some much better off, some much worse off.
Thinking like this is just silly and pointless. Arguing a point based on it is futile and proves nothing. And most of the time it's used to justify a series of completely random events and circumstances in the past as a preordained reason for one's existence, or something to be thankful for because you really wish things were better and need to rationalize it.
>>>
Where would YOU be under such a system? Probably non-existant
>>>
Just try telling that to the poor genetically superior individual whose chance to exist was usurped by the imperfect person who was born instead!
Re:Fix me. (Score:2)
It doesn't quite work that way. The whole idea behind using genetic engineering like this is to do away with genetic deficiencies (like diseases) so that they *aren't* passed on to offspring. You cannot use genetics like this once the person is already fully grown. The changes must be made in the earliest stage of a person's development.
Re:Fix problems, yes. Superior children, no. (Score:2)
We might end up creating monsters that want to do away with all of those who aren't genetically superior.
Presumably, any genetic manipulations making offspring "superior" would implicitely include an impressive learning and retention ability. Assuming they were educated like we are today, they would be emotionally balanced, compassionate, model offspring and probably wouldn't exhibit many of these evil behaviors.
If you are Joe Average, and your kid is Jean Intelligent, can you really relate to him?
Genetics doesn't directly affect a person's intelligence. It can affect a person's learning and retention potential, but the kid still has to learn and experience things like the rest of us. I'm pretty sure any dumb-parent/smart-kid awkwardness would be about the same as it is today.
"In fact, he says, it will be so beneficial that governments may require children to be engineered genetically to prevent development of new socioeconomic gaps."
I think this would be very wrong. if this happens here, I'm moving to another planet.
Would you be opposed then to a community where people weren't allowed to have children on a whim? What if there were laws that stated only competant, emotionally and financially secure couples were allowed to have children? Would this be good or bad?
Personally, I wouldn't have a problem with this at all. Firstly, it nearly guarantees the child will have a decent start in life. Perhaps I'm being cold-hearted, but I do not feel that any family permanently on welfare with obviously no desire or capability of self-sustainance should be bringing children into this world. It adds unnecessary burdon on the rest of us and the children don't tend to have the best of childhoods.
In many ways, though, this is very similar to government-imposed genetic standards. By relegating the ability to reproduce to the people that are most stable and competant, over time, these children will begin to exhibit more positive genetic traits, thusly promoting the gene pool of the hosting country. Just some food for thought..
Download is a transmission to you, upload is a transmission from you.
Personally, I come from a satellite background just as much as I do Internet. The way I've always used the words: Uplinks/uploads are links/transfers to a central hub (BBS/satellite) where Downlinks/downloads are links/transfers to an end user/node (such as a PC or a person's brain). I won't argue with semantics, but it does make sense to me calling it a download too.
Re:Imperfections make the man...or woman... (Score:2)
What makes you think any amount of genetic engineering as discussed here would have had any effect on the behaviors and personalities of these folks?
You seem to be of the impression that genetic engineering implies the creation of "cookie-cutter people," when it doesn't at all. It will be necessary to use genetic engineering eventually to eliminate genetic/hereditary diseases and serious conditions. This should have virtually no effect on a person's learning abilities. It will be desirable to some to use genetics to eliminate things like myopia and heart problems detected early on. Again, these should have virtually no effect on other aspects of a person.
It's been demonstrated frequently that genetics plays a very very tiny role in the behavior and personality of the resulting person. You *never* know how your child is going to "turn out."
I too disagree with the idea of using genetic engineering for vanity purposes, but I think your reasoning is a bit flawed.
Genetic engineering *is* available to everyone.. (Score:2)
There are reasons we find people attractive. It's about damn time people stopped buying into that "it's the personality that counts" crap and started following their instincts. The people that disregard these biological signals are doing themselves and their offspring a disservice.
Re:The Duties of the Parent (Score:2)
A thousand years ago, genetic mutations that made a person weaker, dumber or less fit always resulted in the termination of that genetic line (in some fashion). Only traits that contributed positively (or not at all) to a person's life or reproductive ability were allowed to be passed on (and, indeed, were encouraged).
This has hardly done anything to reduce the diversity or size of the gene pool in the past (and, in fact, this is arguably how all life evolved).
Today, similar negative genetic traits are, in many cases, allowed to survive. Technology (medical and otherwise) are allowing these faulty traits to find their way into offspring.
So, in a way, we've begun to *double* the amount of diversity in our gene pool (allowing both good *and* bad traits to survive). The only way we can get our species back "on track" is to find some way to re-create the evolutionary push towards positive genetic traits.
This push is in the form of genetic engineering and the ability of that to remove or nullify genetic mutations that cause diseases, problems or other complications. If we refuse to do this, our gene pool will eventually become so full of faulty genetic code that we will be forced to rely totally on technology to keep ourselves alive.
Now, I'm not necessarily advocating the use of genetic engineering for "vanity" purposes. Nevertheless, such engineering will eventually occur, and those that refuse to acknowledge it will soon find themselves drifting towards the "lesser" end of the gene pool yardstick.
What's that, Tommy? (Score:2)
--
grappler
Re:vision correction (Score:2)
But then I was thinking: Contact lenses nowadays come with the same UV protective layers as eyeglasses. If this was UV-related, there should be virtually no difference between the UV blocking done by contact lenses and regular eyeglasses, so that must not be it.
Infrared? Doubtful as well. IR is mostly radiated at night, not reflected.
In all likelyhood, the eyeglasses are tinted very slightly (as most are) and that slight tint is enough to cause problems in extremely low-light situations, where every bit of illumination is helpful. Once a person's eyes adapt (assuming they've been eating their carrots), most people don't have much of a hard time moving about in starlight. You might be surprised how much light stars actually provide. Most people don't notice it because the glaring lights of nearby buildings and streetlights provide an unacceptable level of contrast that makes it very difficult for your eyes to sensitize themselves to the starlight.
Re:Why I don't worry about stuff like this... (Score:2)
um, no. ?
Are you saying that we are under an ethical obligation to create a superior species? My first problem starts with "ethical obligation" and goes downhill from there.
Re:Why I don't worry about stuff like this... (Score:2)
A friend of mine just got his master's degree in biological engineering (with an environmental focus). He related to me a study he had seen about the amount of a certain bacteria at a toxic site over the course of 40 years. It seems that the initial tests showed none of this bacteria and the second tests showed median to high-levels. What is significant is that this bacteria happened to be the one that "ate" the toxic waste. Life finds it's niche. I have yet to see a lifeform spring forth from the intelligence of another (your GE + AI), but you never know. Messing with the forces of nature (see: Hurricane) can often leave one wishing one hadn't.
I'm not against these studies (I'm all for 'em), but the application of these technologies should ALWAYS be kept away from scientists, usually they just want to see the bits that are left over, and while Mad Politician might seen likely, Mad Scientist is the more common label.
Re:Imperfections make the man...or woman... (Score:2)
Firstly, you make the assumption that Blake's illnesses could have been corrected via genetic manipulation.
Secondly, you assume that all of his works were derived from his insanity. Blake's "insanity" was simply a period of depression near age 50 due to his work not being recognized.
Regardless, to have the technology to *better* somebody (either by removing genetic failures or in some of the extreme cases presented in this thread, to "improve") and not take advantage of that because of the rather silly notion that diseases, increased likelyhood of depression and other psychological problems, etc., might give us some cool literary products seems just horrible.
Do you think people in early 1800 kept telling themselves that Blake's depression was for his own good? That we'd all get to see some nifty things he'd produce as a result? If Blake's depression could have been avoided somehow, don't you think he might have wanted to do just that?
I wonder how many superior literary and artistic works would never come about because somebody chose not to remove some crippling hereditary disease from their child's genes.
Your argument easily works both ways, and as far as I'm concerned, both ways are equally valid. Given the choice, I'd much rather see a healthier human society.
What the fuck? (Score:2)
All I'm saying is that people should put some faith into the things that draws one person to another. If you find somebody physically and emotionally attractive, there's a reason you find them that way: You have evolved to detect signs of health, fertility and stability in your mate. Today it's very "PC" to ignore these signs and settle for mates that are weak in many of these respects yet strong in other, less important respects.
I don't know how the hell you picked up anything sounding like Hitler from that. Please explain.
You beg the question of knowledge. (Score:2)
--
Deja Moo: The feeling that
Re:Imperfections make the man...or woman... (Score:2)
I'm biased in this. I am bipolar, and I have suffered enormously because of it. But I wouldn't change it if I was offered the chance--it is what I am, and I cannot imagine being better off without it. Happier, definately, but certainly no better.
If your parents had told you today that they knew you would turn out this way but chose to leave those genetic factors built in, would you resent them?
What if you had grown up perfectly normal, and today your parents mentioned to you that, as part of your conception, genetic flaws were discovered that created a likelyhood for the conditions you're experiencing today and that these genetic flaws were removed, making you the normal person you are. Would you resent them? If you had the opportunity to send a message back in time and ask them to leave your genes alone, would you send it?
It's a scary concept thinking that you personally could have come out differently than you are today. The other side of the coin is that, if you had developed differently, with doctored genes, you'd probably feel exactly the same way in favor of the way you turned out. Of course we fear change, but what if there *was* no change? What if that's simply the way we were brought into this world? Would that necessarily be a bad thing?
Re:What the fuck? (Score:2)
All I said was that people should put more faith into the signals their body is giving them.
Where is everyone coming up with all of this stuff they're saying in response? Why does following your instincts mean an increase in mental instability in our gene pool? Please elaborate.
Re:What the fuck? (Score:2)
How so?
If a person is unhealthy and has a diminished learning capacity (how I interpret "ugly" in both of your terms), how can that lead to better offspring?
I don't like this. (Score:2)
But sometimes it's not worth the price. The effects will be far worse than could justify any good that comes out of it. Consider:
1) First, the technique has to be perfected in humans. How many thousands, perhaps even millions, will suffer while that's going on?
2) The movie Gattaca shows a society rife with what it calls "genoism"; the belief that engineered people are superior to those who are non-engineered.
3) Is forcing a kid into what may very well be the wrong kind of body for that child, for no other reason than the parents' interests, really a Good Thing? I've never met anyone who could predict the future; you can't know what your child will be like. Parents who would "sculpt" their children into their own image are, quite frankly, among the most selfish bastards I know of.
4) Consider the problem of hate groups. Talk about adding more fuel to the flames. The most extreme are quite likely to engineer their children to be better "warriors for the race" or whatever. Worse, get these people into power and you really have trouble as engineering becomes mandated.
5) Speaking of warriors, I don't even want to know what sort of things governments are going to mandate. But very likely it won't be a pretty sight.
Genetically engineering children could have some truly remarkable benefits. But it may well not be worth the price. As I said, genetically engineering out birth defects is one thing, but it must be very strictly controlled if things aren't to get totally out of hand.
Heh.. I just did this.. (Score:2)
I think you're pretty much correct with respects to the cause. The peak wavelength (as bright as your typical superbright LED) is probably in the correct 850-900nm spectrum with low-intensity light escaping at much lower (800nm and probably less) wavelengths, which we can see. It seems logical. Kinda nifty, regardless.
Re:What the fuck? (Score:2)
Traits that are a major hinderance result in death. People with traits that result in minor problems (ill health, low mental facilities) tend to mate with others like them at an increased rate.
So you basically have more above-average PEOPLE mating at normal rates, but less below-average people MATING at higher rates, so it all balances out and the net result is a relatively diverse gene pool.
I bet somebody has done a study on this...