Genetic Modification? For or against?

I created another thread in the Science forum roughly on this topic. However, I want to get a wider range of opinions. Are you for Genetic Modification of Humans or are you against it? Why?

on who the human is. :-)

I'm not really speaking on a small scale of a few people, I'm talking on a wider scale - something that effects everyone.

It can be from simple modification, such as giving us immunity from things such as AIDS and other such diseases, to increasing our intelligence, to custom designed children. Any modification and over a rather large number of people. I encourage you to read my other thread in the Science Forum.

Bush so he would actually have a brain and some compassion?

i think any restrictions would prohibit that. Or maybe not.

If it can turn my 60 year old body into that of a twenty year old stud, make that goodlooking stud.

It's like handing a power saw to a toddler. Just because it's there and in his hands, doesn't mean he's ready to use it.

We've already seen evidence of problems with genetically modified plants in agriculture, big problems in cloned animals; The Human Genome Project just finished in 2003.



We know what it is and how it's organized. We do NOT fully understand it all, nor are we ready to start tinkering with the human genome.

I'm against it.

how do we do so?

My mom is blind, I'd love to change that. My dad has a bad heart, I'd love to fix that.
A good friend died at 20 - because of an undiagnosed genetic flaw. He was my best friend.
A girl I dated ended up in an asylum because of severe mental illness. No one visits her in Texas. I understand it is like a cage for animals.

If we could correect the flaw within GW Bush, would not our world be better off?

We will some day have the potential to fix these problems, and we already make the attempt to do it with medications. The question is, of course, is Genetic Modification the next step? If it is, are we prepared for the inevitable consequences?

so far, no nation has used them in war, but one. errr. us.
So far, nuke power is working well, except in 3 mile and Chernobyl.
So far, radio markers have saved hundreds of thousands in medicine, etc.

So, all in all, the birthing pains were horrific, scary and tough, but somehow, humanity survived the first major test - nukes.

This test is tougher, harder, and nastier. We have to grow faster.
But demands and needs tend to do that to humans.
ALmost like we were in a maze that gets ever tougher.

consequences, maybe.

And not everything pre-existing could necessarily be fixed by genetic tinkering. Eliminate future problems that a person might be genetically susceptible to, perhaps.

My mom died of cancer almost 40 years ago (Far, FAR too young, younger than I am now) both my parents were alcoholics, one close friend survived cancer 25 years ago and is still around (he's 52), while another dear friend just died of a heart attack (he was 50) this past summer. I've got a sister with Multiple Sclerosis, and a brother-in-law with Diabetes.

We've all got skin in the game, so don't think I'm being callous here. There are plenty of problems I'd love us to be able to fix; I simply believe we need to know a lot more about how everything interacts before we start fooling around on a genetic level; what else might change for the worse that we don't understand, while we're fixing what we only THINK we do understand? We're just not ready for human genome alterations...not yet. It's also a small leap from such tinkering to wholesale genetic engineering of the unborn. For socio-economic consequences, see GATTACA.

Oh, and as far as tinkering with SpongeHead DumbAss goes, it would have been nice to have made Ol' Babs sterile about 50-odd years ago. :)

I'm not really talking about right now, but in the future it will be possible and I also believe it will be inevitable. It is, in my eyes, the same way Nuclear weapons are. Once we knew the knowledge was within our grasp, it was only a matter of time before it became widespread. The knowledge of genetic modification is within our hands, the question is: Will it be developed? I believe that answer is yes, and I also believe that there are countries seeking to learn how to doing it. The United States is probably researching how to do it right now.

(That would have been #13, not #17)
Your original response to it and mine are more alike than not. :)

In the future, we certainly may be able to use these tools; for now, I remain unconvinced we're ready for the "Popular Science Manual of Genetic Engineering", or "GM for Dummies".

And at my age, I don't expect to see us get there before I go.

I am only 23, and I think it is highly possibly that we will see something like this poke it's head out in the next 10 years, and become a reality within the next 25. I'll be close to 50 years old, but with any luck I'll be around.

Hell it might come sooner than any of us think - look how far science has taken us already. Every year we advance so much that it is difficult to keep up, and it seems that with each advancement we make the faster we advance. It's insane.

I think it is important to think about the implications before it happens, rather than to wait until the time is upon us and haven't had a chance to REALLY think about it. (Mostly, because I fear when that time is upon us, it will be in response to another country who is already in the process of doing it.)

certain diseases. I cannot see it being used for any other reasons - such as to make a "warrior" type person. (This is the reason lot of people are against genetic modification.)

modification period. We aren't good enough at the god game to work on anything larger than a microbe or two.

"We aren't good enough at the god game YET..."

However, in the future it is most certain that we will be good enough to do it, do it effectively and well.

let alone my neighbors! :scared:

all, genetically. Some slower, some faster.
Hybrids did what we could not earlier. Now, we simply speeded up the process.

ALL grasses, corns, grains, legumes, rice, roots are genetically enhanced. Every single one. Good thing, too. we would have starved as a species otherwise.

That is not to say that we can't do things better and in more healthy ways.

when you start to do genetic modifications you go down a slippery slope of what the nazis wanted to do, create the superhuman race. also even though it was back in the 60's star trek warned against eugenics when then had the show about Khan and his followers. all were superhumans and started a world war.

eugenics is a bad place to go.

However, it is a place that we will inevitably go. There are good things that can come from genetic modification, such as immunity to AIDS and other diseases. We could make ourselves more intelligent. We could eliminate some of our evolutionary baggage.

...however, as you pointed out it can also lead us down a darker road.

The question is, how do we prevent the human race from traveling down the dark path and instead choose to use the knowledge and the technology for good rather than for evil?

Do we really WANT this to happen? Suppose they discover, for instance, a specific genetic basis for homosexuality. I'd imagine that would lead to some advocating prevention of homosexuality through genetic manipulation.

Or, to take another potential target for genetic modification...suppose they discover the genetic basis for autism and related conditions. It may seem a good thing on the face of it to imagine no more autistic children being born, but on the other hand, there's evidence that Einstein and Newton (among others) may have been autistic. So is it a good thing to eliminate the thing that may have been responsible for their genius? Where does one draw the line? Do we really want to live in a version of Huxley's "Brave New World"?

I've proposed the very point on what will happen if a homosexual gene is ever found. (I also pointed out that it is likely that if such a gene was ever found, parents would have their unborn children tested, and if found to be a homosexual - abort them. I likened that to genocide.)

I also pointed out in a previous post, that yes... this can lead us down a dark road. However, there are also benefits such as making Humans immune to certain disease. No more diabetes. No more AIDS. The list is rather long.

...and I do not believe it is a question of if it SHOULD happen, but HOW it will happen - because it will inevitably happen. I am willing to bet you anything that certain countries, and the United States would be listed among them, are researching how to genetically modify Humans right now as we discuss this topic. It is too dangerous of a technological breakthrough to allow another nation to become more advanced in the field.

For example, what happens if China begins to genetically modify its citizens? What happens if they all become "super humans"? Other countries will respond by doing the same thing. The question, I believe, is how to PREVENT this from happening and instead encourage the technology to be developed to HELP Humans rather than to destroy Humans.

Evolution produced Republicans

What it really boils down to is who do we want to be in control of it when it happens. We can howl all we want about the dangers, but that's not going to stop it.

We shouldn't condemn those not yet born to have genetic diseases just because of a few luddites rediculous fears agout Eugenics.

the evolution of life has been going on for hundreds of millions of years. The 2500 years of Western history fit into 1 million years 400 times. In other words, all of history from the founding of Greece and Rome through the Middle Ages to the Renaissance, the Enlightenment and modern times, could be repeated 400 times in a single million year cycle. In 1 billion years, it could be repeated 400,000 times. That is the time scale in which the genetic code of all life currently on this planet has developed, refined, eliminated deficient traits, built resistance against disease, optimized biological structures. This is what we are fighting in Kansas, it is what real "intelligent design" is about - the intelligence is in atomic physics which govern all chemistry including that of life.

We pissant positivists think that we've snuck into God's code room when we discover a gene that creates a disease, and that we're equipped to do in 15 years what the universe takes a million years to do (give rise to an error-free improvement in a particular genetic code). Whether we allow for the presence of a God or not, we need to maintain a sense of the scale and complexity of creation. This is not anti-scientific; rather, it defends us against the arrogance of ignorance and self-satisfaction, where our egos drive us to presume that because of some tiny accomplishment, we are now shit-hot and ready to rebuild the place.

And of course, genetic modification of humans in the general sense opens the door to the usual prescriptionist suspects, like the ones in the White House, who would love to define dissent as pathology, just as the Soviets did when they put refuseniks in mental hospitals.

Not on my watch.

whole bloody point.

We had no clue what penecilin would do, but we took a gamble, and saved millions. Same with smallpox, typhoid and other treatments.
WE had no clue that radiation would cure breast cancer. But is does.
We had no clue that we can stop disease. but we can.

Except that our use of antibiotics has created resistant strains of bacterial diseases (including syphilis and tuberculosis). "Unintended consequences", it's called. Most of these resistant strains are currently confined to small areas of Asia, but they won't be forever.

Not to mention that the human population is at what are, most likely, long-term unsustainable levels. You seem to think that selfish hubris justifies ethically questionable medical and scientific practices with unpredictable results. I have to disagree.

curious, and inquisitive. THAT is our strength. If we play to it, we will succeed. What ever the issue might be. It might be rough, it might be ugly, it might be filled with potholes of our own making, but dammit, we are human and we grow. and learn.

Over the past century and a half, our curiosity, inquisitiveness and creativity have brought us: air and water pollution, resource and soil depletion, the ability to destroy the planet a few dozen times over with nuclear weapons, an increasing rate of plant and animal extinction thanks to destruction of habitat and human encroachment, the spectre of human-induced climate change with potentially catastrophic results...would you call these things success? Would you say that we, as a species, have actually LEARNED anything (other than how to manipulate our environment in ways unimaginable a relatively short time ago)? Again, I'd have to disagree. I have much less faith in the ability of humanity to consider the consequences of its collective actions than you seem to.

seriously, you miss all the good that has come.
Dental care, prenatal care, plastics, medicines, energy production, personal travel, communications.

If you want to go back to the stone ages, please do so. Bye bye!
My point is if you opened your eyes to everything that happens, much good has come from tecchnology and creativity. far better than the problems we also cause. That just means we need to do better.

Do you take any prescription drugs? Have you ever had surgery to correct a life threatening problem? Have you had children? That is all, in some small way, tinkering with evolution. By having children you pass on your genetic traits. By taking drugs to prolong your life, you are denying the inevitable and effecting the lives of others (which may impact them passing on their genetic traits) - or prolong your life so that you can have more children (thus passing on more of your genes). The same goes for surgery.

Everything you do in some small way effects evolution. Anything you do to effect your environment effects evolution, and not just on humans but on other species as well. By living longer you are taking up a job that someone younger could possibly have, and with more income they might decide to have more children. By living longer you effect the economy, which effects millions of others - through social security and other benefits for the elderly. You also take up space. You pollute the air when you go places, making it less breathable for future generations - you do a million things in your every day life that effects the evolution (both positive and negative) on the world around you.

Of course, it is arrogant to say that you alone have that impact - but when I say "you" I am speaking in a broader term - to include millions of people.

I doubt few people will complain about the e-coli that were modified to secrete human insulin, especially since they were also modified to die in direct sunlight. This is only one of may substances that are now efficiently produced by bacteria. We feed the bacteria, and they don't seem to mind.

However, when it comes to modifying anything above the level of bacteria, I am terribly afraid we're entering the arena of unintended consequences. An example of that is the GM corn that was developed to be resistant to corn borers but turned out to kill bees and monarch butterflies.

it will change any time soon. It's not an easy thing to do.
But we can genetically modify mice.

The problem with humans doing it in a lab is that it is profit-driven rather than done with the best interests of humanity and the world in mind. This is the problem with genetically modified food. GM food isn't bad, despite what luddites' paranoia. However, GM food produced by corporate agribusinesses don't give a shit about anything other than their profit, and this means that their product could be dangerous, just as Firestone tires on SUVs or Three Mile Island. When profit is placed before humanity, dangerous corners are cut. Thus, it is the sociopathic corporate mentality that is dangerous, not genetic modification itself.

If we could make sure that the modifications were done carefully, responsibly and with an environmental conscious (yes, this can be done), there would be nothing more to fear than any other scary thing about life and our universe. In fact, it may be necessary for the survival of humanity. We will likely not find out in our lifetimes.

For one thing, ethics and law has not come close to keeping up with technology and I believe that is dangerous.

The really big thing I have a problem with is the potential for things like a Brave New World scenario with Alphas Betas etc. I also think eugenics could play into this isuue. There are way too many crazy people and who knows what kind of monsters could be created by tinkering with perfectly good genes. Breeding athletes, supermodels, etc is silly and potentially dangerous to me.

One exception I would make to what I said already is that if there is disease, or something like that which could be prevented, modification makes more sense.

In a perfect world - genetic modification to stop disease in its tracks. Good deal.

In our world - insurance companies using riders against/for certain modifications, the commodification of sexuality using genetic modification to insure we all have that "perfect look," "religious" fundamentalists using genetic modification to remove the "gay gene" and the "uppity (fill in the blank) gene" so we can all become better automotons, the military industrial complex using the "warrior gene" to create better cannon fodder, pharmaceutical companies insuring "money diseases" are in abundance.

Naw, I see to many negatives in our world. *sigh*

will we still be "human"?

...and really that is one of the key issues around the debate. How do you define Human? Is a Human simply a lump of genes or is being Human something deeper? Do "modifieds" deserve the same rights as "non-modifieds"?