Community > Science & Philosophy

Topic: Creating Life
Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sun 04/08/12 07:24 PM
Now that man has started the process of creating life, where will it go? What are it's limits? What can you imagine? I think about this all the time, and if I'm in open minded (or scientifically literate) company, make seemingly outlandish casual comments about what might be coming our way. The limitations will be cultural, not scientific. Some of the less outlandish prospects include programming non-human animals to serve humanity... birds that clean litter from hiking trails, rats inspect the sewage system and report problems, monkeys that harvest fruit and operate machinery...until they protest and demand basic sentient rights. If culture permits, humans will also engineer themselves (their children) in pursuit of various notions of perfection or excellence in appearance, intelligence, health, athletic prowess... Yes, a lot of those scenarios have been explored by many sci-fi stories and movies.. I would like to have myself cloned.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Sun 04/08/12 07:28 PM
this is the super rich elites dream come true they will live forever while you will inserted with terminator genes you will be a good worker bee Volant, occasionally you and I are in such surprising agreement. This won't happen in the US or in western europe (not anytime soon, anyway), but it could very well happen in any nation in which extreme nationalism, emperor-worship, or theocracy has a grip. A year ago I read about the identification of genes that influence a persons political leanings. Consider the interest some political movements have in influencing reproductive freedom. Consider that China already exercise an astounding level of control over the reproduction of their citizens. This has scary implications. I think they are already doing strange things in China and don't be too sure that they are not doing it here in secret. This country has a lot of top secret things going on that no one knows about.

metalwing Joined Fri 11/14/08 Posts: 26218	Sun 04/08/12 08:34 PM
Now that man has started the process of creating life, where will it go? What are it's limits? What can you imagine? I think about this all the time, and if I'm in open minded (or scientifically literate) company, make seemingly outlandish casual comments about what might be coming our way. The limitations will be cultural, not scientific. Some of the less outlandish prospects include programming non-human animals to serve humanity... birds that clean litter from hiking trails, rats inspect the sewage system and report problems, monkeys that harvest fruit and operate machinery...until they protest and demand basic sentient rights. If culture permits, humans will also engineer themselves (their children) in pursuit of various notions of perfection or excellence in appearance, intelligence, health, athletic prowess... Culture. What an interesting perspective. As with most things the deciding factor is usually money. China has plenty. The computerized genomes would be those created and wanted by that culture. Dragons? Oil money would give the middle east a shot at making whatever they want too. Given an Islamic Theocracy, what would they create?

massagetrade Joined Thu 02/22/07 Posts: 8505	Sun 04/08/12 09:38 PM
Now that man has started the process of creating life, where will it go? What are it's limits? What can you imagine? I think about this all the time, and if I'm in open minded (or scientifically literate) company, make seemingly outlandish casual comments about what might be coming our way. The limitations will be cultural, not scientific. Some of the less outlandish prospects include programming non-human animals to serve humanity... birds that clean litter from hiking trails, rats inspect the sewage system and report problems, monkeys that harvest fruit and operate machinery...until they protest and demand basic sentient rights. If culture permits, humans will also engineer themselves (their children) in pursuit of various notions of perfection or excellence in appearance, intelligence, health, athletic prowess... Culture. What an interesting perspective. As with most things the deciding factor is usually money. China has plenty. The computerized genomes would be those created and wanted by that culture. Dragons? Oil money would give the middle east a shot at making whatever they want too. Given an Islamic Theocracy, what would they create? When I was a child I read about new techniques that would allow a range of surgical modifications to the human body to become newly possible, or cheaper, safer, and more accessible. From what I'd seen of teenagers, I was pretty sure that this would lead to a crazy level of body modification for aesthetic purposes, with people surgically implanting (for example) sockets for metal spikes and chains on their body. This didn't happen, as I'd imagined it. We've seen a huge increase in breast augmentation, and similar... and then we have a tiny fringe of people doing things like this: http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=136218071&page=1 (much of which doesn't even require surgery). But just because we developed the technology to do something, does mean that people will do it. This is why I say that culture will be hugely important to how we use genetic engineering on humans. It will be possibly to program our children to be 9 feet tall, or 2 feet tall, or be born bright blue and then say turn bright yellow with puberty and red with adulthood, or to have 4 functional arms, and such... but those choices will ultimately be limited by culture, not technology nor finances. I do think we are likely to program people to meet mainstream cultural ideals of body type. But even after it becomes possible and cheap to give our kids massive folding bat-wings, culture may dictate that we don't.

Sterling_2012 Joined Sat 04/07/12 Posts: 31	Sun 04/08/12 09:54 PM
Now that man has started the process of creating life, where will it go? What are it's limits? What can you imagine? I think about this all the time, and if I'm in open minded (or scientifically literate) company, make seemingly outlandish casual comments about what might be coming our way. The limitations will be cultural, not scientific. Some of the less outlandish prospects include programming non-human animals to serve humanity... birds that clean litter from hiking trails, rats inspect the sewage system and report problems, monkeys that harvest fruit and operate machinery...until they protest and demand basic sentient rights. If culture permits, humans will also engineer themselves (their children) in pursuit of various notions of perfection or excellence in appearance, intelligence, health, athletic prowess... Culture. What an interesting perspective. As with most things the deciding factor is usually money. China has plenty. The computerized genomes would be those created and wanted by that culture. Dragons? Oil money would give the middle east a shot at making whatever they want too. Given an Islamic Theocracy, what would they create? When I was a child I read about new techniques that would allow a range of surgical modifications to the human body to become newly possible, or cheaper, safer, and more accessible. From what I'd seen of teenagers, I was pretty sure that this would lead to a crazy level of body modification for aesthetic purposes, with people surgically implanting (for example) sockets for metal spikes and chains on their body. This didn't happen, as I'd imagined it. We've seen a huge increase in breast augmentation, and similar... and then we have a tiny fringe of people doing things like this: http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=136218071&page=1 (much of which doesn't even require surgery). But just because we developed the technology to do something, does mean that people will do it. This is why I say that culture will be hugely important to how we use genetic engineering on humans. It will be possibly to program our children to be 9 feet tall, or 2 feet tall, or be born bright blue and then say turn bright yellow with puberty and red with adulthood, or to have 4 functional arms, and such... but those choices will ultimately be limited by culture, not technology nor finances. I do think we are likely to program people to meet mainstream cultural ideals of body type. But even after it becomes possible and cheap to give our kids massive folding bat-wings, culture may dictate that we don't. I have to agree with that! Most public sentiment now about genetic modifications is negative based upon religious sentiment. I say that because a president set a precident to try to make it difficult if not impossible because most research in its infancy then required stemcells from non-living babies. Sorry I tried to sugar coat it. Now we have found stemcells in many other parts of the body as of a few years ago. So, since this religious sentiment or elements within organizations which have that sentiment push for power with lots of money... I don't see it happening. Without enough funding and just a small company a few million dollars won't advance squat.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Mon 04/09/12 08:02 AM Edited by Jeanniebean on Mon 04/09/12 08:03 AM
http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=136218071&page=1 I think there might be a few rare and strange or troubled people who want to look freaky for whatever reason, but probably the largest percentage will be people who want to look beautiful and perfect. I don't understand why a person even wants to look goth except to stand out and be different from the crowd or rebel against a society. In a place were freaks abound, (like New York) it could become a fad to see who can look the most extreme. I can't even see getting a tattoo because it is so permanent. I'm afraid of that kind of commitment. I change my mind too often. A temporary tattoo is good enough for me.

metalwing Joined Fri 11/14/08 Posts: 26218	Mon 04/09/12 01:42 PM
Now that man has started the process of creating life, where will it go? What are it's limits? What can you imagine? I think about this all the time, and if I'm in open minded (or scientifically literate) company, make seemingly outlandish casual comments about what might be coming our way. The limitations will be cultural, not scientific. Some of the less outlandish prospects include programming non-human animals to serve humanity... birds that clean litter from hiking trails, rats inspect the sewage system and report problems, monkeys that harvest fruit and operate machinery...until they protest and demand basic sentient rights. If culture permits, humans will also engineer themselves (their children) in pursuit of various notions of perfection or excellence in appearance, intelligence, health, athletic prowess... Culture. What an interesting perspective. As with most things the deciding factor is usually money. China has plenty. The computerized genomes would be those created and wanted by that culture. Dragons? Oil money would give the middle east a shot at making whatever they want too. Given an Islamic Theocracy, what would they create? When I was a child I read about new techniques that would allow a range of surgical modifications to the human body to become newly possible, or cheaper, safer, and more accessible. From what I'd seen of teenagers, I was pretty sure that this would lead to a crazy level of body modification for aesthetic purposes, with people surgically implanting (for example) sockets for metal spikes and chains on their body. This didn't happen, as I'd imagined it. We've seen a huge increase in breast augmentation, and similar... and then we have a tiny fringe of people doing things like this: http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=136218071&page=1 (much of which doesn't even require surgery). But just because we developed the technology to do something, does mean that people will do it. This is why I say that culture will be hugely important to how we use genetic engineering on humans. It will be possibly to program our children to be 9 feet tall, or 2 feet tall, or be born bright blue and then say turn bright yellow with puberty and red with adulthood, or to have 4 functional arms, and such... but those choices will ultimately be limited by culture, not technology nor finances. I do think we are likely to program people to meet mainstream cultural ideals of body type. But even after it becomes possible and cheap to give our kids massive folding bat-wings, culture may dictate that we don't. I have to agree with that! Most public sentiment now about genetic modifications is negative based upon religious sentiment. I say that because a president set a precident to try to make it difficult if not impossible because most research in its infancy then required stemcells from non-living babies. Sorry I tried to sugar coat it. Now we have found stemcells in many other parts of the body as of a few years ago. So, since this religious sentiment or elements within organizations which have that sentiment push for power with lots of money... I don't see it happening. Without enough funding and just a small company a few million dollars won't advance squat. The possibility of giant folding bat wings may not occur for the common population just to be cool, but a way to get around in a large spaceship designed for generations of long flight might be a different story. Workers who could work in empty space without a spacesuit would be possible given that they could go back in for air every hour or so like a whale. Of greater concern is weapons development. It is always present and money always seeks it out. Governments seldom respect patents when it comes to warfare. In the case of original genomes, the deadlier they are, the smaller and easier to make. This Pandora's box may be much tougher to keep shut than the one which held the atom.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Mon 04/09/12 01:49 PM
Governments seldom respect patents when it comes to warfare. Or anything else they decide they want. It goes to prove that you can't trust your government.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Mon 04/09/12 01:51 PM
Bottom line, laws are for the slaves (the people). They are not for the owners of the world and their installed governments. There are people who (seriously) are way above the laws. The laws simply don't apply to them.

creativesoul Joined Mon 04/16/07 Posts: 9166	Tue 04/10/12 11:17 AM
The ethical concerns are strong regarding such matters, and they're not all religious ones.

metalwing Joined Fri 11/14/08 Posts: 26218	Tue 04/10/12 01:28 PM
The ethical concerns are strong regarding such matters, and they're not all religious ones. Party one with money - "Can you design me a bug that kills?" Party two with access to DNA computer. "I can make you a synthetic bug that kills only those who you desire to be killed!" "Such as?" "So far we can isolate attack genomes of blacks, Arabs, whites, central Asian, East Asian, Aborigine, and people with blue eyes." "What about Jews?" "Give us time. We are working on it."

creativesoul Joined Mon 04/16/07 Posts: 9166	Tue 04/10/12 07:43 PM
Something like that. There are some crazy folk in this world, and many of them have enough capital to pursue such a thing, or others... all in the name of defense, though... not offense.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Tue 04/10/12 07:58 PM
Something like that. There are some crazy folk in this world, and many of them have enough capital to pursue such a thing, or others... all in the name of defense, though... not offense. "In the name of defense..." is just a cover of course. Assassination and genocide still happens, don't kid yourself.

creativesoul Joined Mon 04/16/07 Posts: 9166	Tue 04/10/12 08:14 PM
The wink ought to have let you know, Jb, that that was tongue-in-cheek...

metalwing Joined Fri 11/14/08 Posts: 26218	Tue 04/10/12 08:27 PM
Exxon synthetic Biology engineer "We have the new bug perfected Sir!" Corporate Yahoo "Good. What does it do?" "It eats the tar from a tar sand formation and craps out light crude!" "How long does it take?" " In five years North America will have the largest oil reserves in the world!" "Good job! To Secretary "Get me land leasing."

creativesoul Joined Mon 04/16/07 Posts: 9166	Tue 04/10/12 09:17 PM Edited by creativesoul on Tue 04/10/12 09:18 PM
Indeed. How can we use this technology to make the most money?

metalwing Joined Fri 11/14/08 Posts: 26218	Wed 04/11/12 05:04 AM
Doctor to Pregnant mother: "We need to give your child the ability to fight off all know diseases so I will give you a shot now. Mother: "What's in the shot?" "A man made retrovirus that will inject it's genetic code into the cells of your growing baby and rewrite it's genome to make it better!" "But I don't want my fetus to have a virus!" "Madam, it's federal law!"

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Wed 04/11/12 09:06 AM
The wink ought to have let you know, Jb, that that was tongue-in-cheek... I missed that. I thought the statement was quite strange.

Jeanniebean Joined Wed 01/30/08 Posts: 40028	Wed 04/11/12 09:07 AM
Doctor to Pregnant mother: "We need to give your child the ability to fight off all know diseases so I will give you a shot now. Mother: "What's in the shot?" "A man made retrovirus that will inject it's genetic code into the cells of your growing baby and rewrite it's genome to make it better!" "But I don't want my fetus to have a virus!" "Madam, it's federal law!" That sounds about right. Over my dead body. Which won't be long... God help our descendants.

metalwing Joined Fri 11/14/08 Posts: 26218	Thu 04/12/12 08:42 PM
The Colonel to the General: "Sir, we have completed the prime soldier project!" The General: "For twenty billion dollars, it's about time! What can he do?" "He can run for days at twenty miles an hour. He can bench press over 700 pounds. He has eyesight better than an eagle and reflexes better than a mongoose! He is absolutely loyal to any officer sprayed with a special pheromone we have developed. Under orders, he will die trying to kill the enemy!" "What happens if the enemy gets the pheromone?" "Well ... that could be bad."