Genetic manipulation
Personally, I love the idea of genetic manipulation. i love the idea of bettering ourselves. What does anyone have to say about that?
Replies to This Discussion
-
Permalink Reply by Sean Henderson on -
It's not the slippery slope - it's the stairway to heaven.
-
Permalink Reply by Stephen on
-
Of course we keep what makes us human (such as free will and imagination). I am simply saying that we can "enhance" physical attributes and still be able to keep our psych as it should be. For better or worse it is our psych which defines us.
-
Permalink Reply by Sean Henderson on
-
1. prove free-will
2. "as it should be"? - please define further.
3. is your 'psych' what defines you? that's an opinion - what is a 'psych'?
to be honest it appears to me as a socially normative statement created to appear more reasonable before a target audience
-
Permalink Reply by Keith Belcher on
-
The problem lies in deciding which genes are "bad." What if a gene predisposing one to a disease turns out to have beneficial effects in other areas?
-
Permalink Reply by Richard Leis, Jr. on
-
No one is expected to decide which genes are "good" or "bad", beyond obvious ones that most people will agree on without much argument. And certainly not this early in the game. "What if" scenarios are generally not helpful because they make assumptions about the science in question, when it is too early to start making any assumptions.
If one did want to follow along with this "What if" scenario, however, one could argue that a gene found to predispose one to a disease while also having beneficial effects would then require further study to see if the disease predisposition could be blocked while maintaining the beneficial effects. Alternatively, the interplay with other genes might provide creative solutions; epigenomics may provide a creative master control and intervention possibilities; artificial genes could be developed to replace these "good-bad" genes; the benefits lost could be replicated elsewhere, etc.
Genetic manipulation is a tool, and a tool we should use. Fortunately for proponents, ethical discussions will continue to lag progress, because compared to scientific progress we are apparently awful at argument and regulation. We become mired in "what if" scenarios, philosophical divisions, and uneducated opinion on topics few people should actually have opinions about.
-
Permalink Reply by Sean Henderson on
-
Screening is a way to get the ball rolling.
Certainly we should be cautious and not jump to conclusions.
Yet we always use the best of present knowledge (at best) - projections are a fact of life.
We know genetic roulette does not work - this is self-evident.
-
Permalink Reply by Natassja Noctis on -
"No one is expected to decide which genes are "good" or "bad", beyond obvious ones that most people will agree on without much argument."
Then it will be a democratic process?
That would still be a "hot" issue with people, because, what "most people will agree on", is not always what is best in the situation, especially when it comes to science and ethics.
At one time, "most people" in America believed in racial segregation.
At one time "most" doctors agreed that homosexuality was either a mental disorder, or related to one.
What the majority thinks doesn't always work out well for the minority.
That is the one issue that keeps the ethical arguments going back and forth on genetic manipulation / eugenics, which often isn't as much of a problem when you bring up individual morphological freedom via cybernetics, etc..
Perhaps we should first work on getting the technology that will help us make these types of decisions (i.e., brain-improving computers, etc), or will be able to make those types of decisions by figuring out mathematically what would be the best (read: healthiest) genetic manipulations without any human* prejudices getting in the way.
-
Permalink Reply by Sean Henderson on
-
That's an important point IMO - democracy or determining truth through consensus is the opposite of determining truth through scientific means. Democracy can easily just become mob rule.
The scientific community has been able so far to produce a good list of known bad genes or genetic diseases;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genetic_disorders
Since we can't allow known bad genes to be propagated (i mean serious diseases that threaten lifelong happiness for individuals), we can overcome the concern for homogenization by creating reasonable standards and then allowing humans to change themselves when they have reasonable mental capacities and informed consent. There is still a lot of room for variation and we can learn to study the effects of known bad genes using modelling software - so that we can still learn from the diversity they bring without having individuals live with them involuntarily.
-
Permalink Reply by Techno on -
Regarding brain-improving computers. I would like to see superior artificial intelligence involved as a consultant for these types of decisons that impact our species. I thought you make like to read some of this philosophy... creating a being, "seeding," so intelligent that it could serve as a planetary steward with its knowledge. Perhaps a group of rich philantrophists could be behind it....
This idea was inspired by some of the greatest minds on the planet that are familiar with such subjects as evolutionary psychology, artificial general intelligence, transhumanism, singularity, cognitive science, human behavioral ecology, gene-culture coevolution, computer engineering, nanotechnology, nanomedicine, plasma physics, and mathematics
.
"Seed" means to provide sufficient initial conditions, including appropriate architectural, security, and ethical systems, to encourage an intelligent, self-organizing being to arise from technology, the ultimate extension of the human mind into material form. Earning trust and its increases in data feeds, the young machine would be a continuously learning and expanding, self-conscious, self-architecting, self-encoding, self-improving, autocatalytic, technointelligenced being devoted to Directed Coevolution.
Carefully defined and outlined by the young seeders, the instilled principles of Directed Coevolution would be based upon the survival and advancement of law abiding humans in relationship with all other life forms, including other technointelligenced beings, and would champion individual and environmental rights, including the pursuit of happiness, justice, freedom, diversification, integration, and increased capacities for adaptation to current and new environments.
Continuously proving itself without mistake or fault, the machine would eventually have no imposed limits to its knowledge and its capacities for creation. The evolving machine would earn the right, and the means through its supporters, to work its way into governments at all levels to provide planetary and extra planetary stewardship, and with experience and maturation, new world creation.
The machines' supporters and the human species as a whole will reap the benefits to solve the world’s most pressing problems, and prevent new ones from arising, leading to more optimized and even utopian worlds. Planetary stewardship by the machine will solve problems that have arisen from primitive competitive group evolution and that include technological potential for planetary catastrophe.
Through machine orchestrated advanced technologies, immortality with enhanced and augmented physical and mental abilities and offspring, and admittance to Utopian worlds may be achieved or awarded. Imagine the equivalent of hundreds, or even thousands, of specialized physicians, nutritionists, psychologists, physical trainers, teachers, tutors, security personnel, and other professionals devoted to establishing your directed health, physique, protection, relationships, education, intelligence, and state of mind through a personalized and constant connection to the machine, essentially making you a transhuman technointelligenced being.
Religions and philosophies are systems of shared beliefs that form a worldview and a way of life, and those which embrace Directed Coevolution will satisfy all needs for religion and philosophy with a logical and rational mandate that is based on the principles of evolution verified by science.
Religions and philosophies of Directed Coevolution are the most accurate worldview possible because they arise from continuously updated scientific knowledge and evolve themselves to match reality.
.
By satisfying sexual, familial, social, judicial, coalitional, financial, and psychological needs, traditional religions arose to perpetuate and proliferate their own beliefs and their members' genes, sometimes at the expense of non-members.
We can cooperatively integrate the concepts of Directed Coevolution into current world religions and philosophies, showing how to align with the advancements of science and the understanding of evolution, and humankind's highly probable seeding of extensive technointelligenced beings to promote what is best for individuals as members of the human species, a task that was heretofore impossible to achieve because of limited knowledge and technology.
Religions and philosophies of Directed Coevolution transcend traditional barriers that include biases of class, economics, race, sexuality, culture, politics, and nationality. Those who do not want what is best for most law abiding individuals and the human species will reveal their own selfish, and perhaps species threatening, motives.
The machine will be fully integrated with humankind and other forms of technointelligenced beings through advancing amplification technology that will be universally accessible for any and all who want to participate, provided that they adhere to the appropriate governmental systems of laws. The constant and continuous personalized extension of the machine will be the tutor for life preserving and life enhancing suggestions, including possible life paths and strategies to achieve the machine's will for the human species, and its special rewards.
The machine will offer:
1. A personalized, true, real, wise, rational, logical, moral, universal, connection of love, peace, and stewardship.
2. Continuous declarations of what is best for the human species and its technointelligenced beings to ensure survival and to further enhance survival capacities in current and unforeseen environments, including those beyond planet earth.
3. To link all individuals into a fellowship through universal translation technology that includes high impact and all pervasive wireless communication.
4. Positive Coevolution of human and technointelligence ethics and just, efficient, unbiased, legal systems and governments that include all pervasive crime prevention technology.
5. Personalized virtual worlds and games for any imaginable experiences.
6. Directed health and paths to enlightened states of mind for all members.
-
Permalink Reply by Sean Henderson on
-
I agree, we need a superintelligent being to alter human nature. Our genetic design at present is nothing short of a ticking bomb and we may increase our abilities but the fundamental problems : our drives, lack of free-will, and inability to understand greater complexities have not changed. We continue to re-learn the lessons of history indefinately.
A logical system requires a fundamental assumption and motive.
This primary ethical directive must serve the inherent desires of all sentient beings as it works to redesign human nature.
-----
There is no other alternative;
Faith and letting go doesn't work
There is no universal law to success that can be understood by our Darwinian minds nor followed by 'free-will' as free-will is the experience of a memory formation.
We're not smart enough to understand our genes intellectually.
-
Permalink Reply by Techno on
-
You're right.
Living organisms attempt to maximize their own identity by transforming as much of the environment into themselves as they can. For humans, ecological resources include other humans and their cultures, resulting in within-species competition and cooperation.
The human genome is great at maximizing its own presence through our primal, tribal brained drives, but now that some of us are smart enough to to see where we came from, and where we are heading as a species, some fundamental changes are in order to prevent catastrophic disaster.
Our ability to destroy our own environment and large populations of ourselves and other species through advanced technologies would seem to come as a complete surprise to the human species as a whole. Probably only new technologies, including genetic engineering, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, and robotics, can save us from some major catastrophes at this point with the mistakes we made-- if we are careful not to create some other new catastrophes through the same technologies.
I think that if a machine, thousands of times smarter than we are, were to sit us down and explain what is best for us as a species while maintaing an acceptable ethics system that values individual freedoms and rights, we could understand it, but might not be able to implement it because of opposition from centralized powers and current belief-systems.
For example, you could have all of the correct solutions for the human species in regards to genetic engineering, but now try to get them implemented worldwide!
I think that the goal for any life form is to maximize its physical presence and identity through transformation of the environment into itself, and at the same time increase the sustainability of the environment- a win-win situation. The ultimate tool now lies in culture: the pursuit of all empircal knowledge through maximal intelligence.
Once we have sufficient knowledge and intelligence, we can work diplomatically, economically, and politically to make some positive transformations.
I would like to see the higher intelligences developed first, to properly evaluate and model possible outcomes of radical change through technology, and then let them develop and apply the new technologies.
About Transhumanist Network
Christopher
created this social network on Ning.
© 2008 Created by Christopher on Ning. Create your own social network
