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China confirms birth of gene-edited babies, HIV resistant edited twins under observation. Scientist He Jiankui to be punished.
- Thread starter Chairman Tickles
- Start date
triplestation
Member
Greedings
Member
This whole story is a whole crock of shit. We don't even know if he managed it. He also managed to choose a mutation that's unfalsifiable:
"Hey look, the baby didn't get HIV! I did it!"
"Oh they got HIV? Yeah, the CCR4 receptor isn't the only entry for the virus, I guess that's why."
90% chance it's all fake.
"Hey look, the baby didn't get HIV! I did it!"
"Oh they got HIV? Yeah, the CCR4 receptor isn't the only entry for the virus, I guess that's why."
90% chance it's all fake.
Thurible
Member
First of all I would like to thank you for taking the time to articulate your thoughts on the matter so a proper discussion on the issue of human gene editing and whether or not it is evolution/step in the right direction can take place.
I would also like to apologize for constantly making the point about how evolution =/= betterment/perfection. It just seems to me that most people do not understand that evolution does not take a species to an objectively better place. I shouldn't have assumed that your argument for "evolution" included that oft stated misconception. So I apologize for that again.
Now then, on to my reply. I suppose one could argue that a sort of form of evolutionary change can be self directed as you suggest. However, one has to admit that this concept of an immediate self directed change in the human genome is absolutely unlike anything that has ever been done. I do not think our current definition and ideas of the evolutionary process would fit into this. Evolution has simply never been a concious self directed choice. Also one has to consider that the changes done with human gene editing will be different from person to person. We are not talking about a change that affects everyone and certain people will have different edits for different purposes (Though evolution itself branches out and is not monolithic, possibly like this).
One also has to consider if this is indeed an "evolution", then the person wouldn't be a human as we know it. Would an edited person not be a human? Would they be equal, lesser, or perhaps even beyond a human being if they aren't? What makes a man? I would argue that a man is a man and I don't think any change made would delinerate a person from humankind. I doubt anything strange and fantastic would happen.
Rentahamster
Rodent Whores
Do you consider this to be evolution?
How about this?
If we can still breed with each other, we're still the same species.
Chairman Tickles
Banned
Keep dreaming.
Chinese scientists successfully clone five baby monkeys after editing genes to induce mental illness
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/sci...ts-successfully-clone-five-baby-monkeys-after
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ResilientBanana
Member
As unethical as this all may seem, scientists should be testing all the possibilities. What if it leads us to be cancer free, immune to viruses, live for decades longer, or even able to survive interstellar travel? That would be remarkable!
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Thurible
Member
I feel like kind of an idiot for possibly just realizing this, but are you some kind of transhumanist? By transhumanism I mean the belief that humanity will somehow transcend itself through scientific means in the near future. Isn't that sort of a very optimistic (and I would argue odd and irrational) way of looking at what could possibly come to pass? Why do you seem to have so much faith in these ideas?
Greedings
Member
Why am I dreaming? One team doing one thing, does not mean another team did something different. Like, what's your logic here?
The ability to do this stuff has been around for years, whether through classic Lentiviral delivery, or more recently through CRISPR (which is NOT the wonder editing technique people believe, it's full of off-target effects). He's experiment isn't a step forward in science, it's a step back in ethics.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-07607-3
He did not provide any sequencing data, any confirmation, any sort of way what was done can be corroborated. On top of that, He used a mutation that's completely unfalsifiable by phenotype.
"I CRISPR'd babies!"
"Prove it"
"..."
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Omega Supreme Holopsicon
Member
Koomey's law means within decades we will match or surpass the computational energy efficiency of the brain. At the same time we are about to master the ultimate algorithm, the final algorithm, the heart of mathematics and science, the ultimate question.
the master algorithm
Humanity will either destroy itself or it will transcend. There is no way you can take the essence of man, the core of intelligence, and pass it upon man's tools and it not radically alter the world.
We are about to harness the fundamental force behind all progress, the fundamental nature of intelligence.
The human brain is limited by the skull, by the cranial capacity, it is also limited to about 20W of energy. Soon machines with unlimited size and power consumption will run the algorithms within the brain unconstrained. Theoretically optimized to the limits, if the principles of intelligence, are simple enough.
H
hariseldon
Unconfirmed Member
FTFY.
womfalcs3
Banned
More like 3-inch penises to 4-in penises in China, amirite?
Not impossible for sure.
Don't forget most common thing too, lemon.Do you consider this to be evolution?
How about this?
If we can still breed with each other, we're still the same species.
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Thurible
Member
Everything you touched upon and insist is going to be an inevitability is either a thought experiment or rooted in science fiction. I see absolutely no basis for these ideas other than they sound intriguing. I suppose small changes to the phenotype and genotype can be argued, as this is a thread about a man supposedly doing the first gene edit to humans and we have certainly made changes to other organisms. However, you seem to suggest that people will be "like gods" without any limitations, truly fantastic and outlandish. The science behind our physical reality does not exist to serve mankind for it's betterment. It exists independently of human beings. There is no inevitability of cyborg edited god men. The only inevitability that we have in science about our fate as human beings is that we all will die one day and entrophy will take place.
Questions:
What is this "master algorithm"? Are you implying that all knowledge can be obtainable?
Also, who said that man will pass his intelligence to his tools (I also don't quite understand your meaning)? What do you mean by the fundamental force of intelligence? How do you know that these things will happen when we know so little about the world around us and ourselves?
Omega Supreme Holopsicon
Member
The master algorithm, or algorithms, are artificial general intelligence or true ai.
You may not know it but the tools to analyze the brain are improving, ever better ones are coming online. Right now deep learning is also even being applied to brain activity data, and unraveling its causal structure. Ever better brain scanning instruments will allow for ever more fine grained data, and narrow ai will allow analysis of it at a deeper level than ever before.
At the same time billions are being spent on R&D of AI, even research towards true AI is being financed.
We will attain the ability to synthesize DNA and other alternate molecular memory. The ability to design proteins, even novel ones will be attained, and also other novel molecular machines. Now AGI means, you have an unlimited number of Ph.d level expert engineers, working 24 7, potentially thinking and acting faster than any human, 10-100x faster or more within simplified virtual environments. This means dominion of synthetic biology, as an unlimited number of immortal super experts comes to be. Even artificial complex multicellular life, new organisms, becomes possible.
What I mean by passing our intelligence to our tools, is the attainment of AGI. Smarter, faster, more resilient. Just like Usain Bolt may have trouble keeping up with a Tesla, even Einstein or Newton would pale in comparison to what will be built with the algorithms of intelligence.
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Ailynn
Faith - Hope - Love
The sci-fi fan in me is intrigued by all of this. As someone whose family has suffered abnormal gene-alteration via prenatal Diethylstilbestrol exposure, I can't help imagine a future where children can be born without any such issues that can make life so much more difficult.
Could disease be wiped out? Could physical or mental handicaps be eradicated? Is it possible gender dysphoria could become a thing of the past? Will superhumans eventually become a reality?
. . .Will humanity achieve immortality?
The following Bible verse has caused me to wonder about the reality of such an achievement. What would happen if we scientifically reach a place where society is literally unable to die?
It seems the end would be upon us...
"And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them." - Revelations 9:6
Dear scientists,
I appreciate all you do, and please keep doing all the cool things and stuff and junk! Just, y'know...don't be so quick to bring about our complete annihilation...okay?
Could disease be wiped out? Could physical or mental handicaps be eradicated? Is it possible gender dysphoria could become a thing of the past? Will superhumans eventually become a reality?
. . .Will humanity achieve immortality?
The following Bible verse has caused me to wonder about the reality of such an achievement. What would happen if we scientifically reach a place where society is literally unable to die?
It seems the end would be upon us...
"And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them." - Revelations 9:6
Dear scientists,
I appreciate all you do, and please keep doing all the cool things and stuff and junk! Just, y'know...don't be so quick to bring about our complete annihilation...okay?
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Trogdor1123
Gold Member
I can't understand why anyone would want this, it will mean that you, and your children are literally obsolete within a generation.... Some enlightened self interest maybe?
Omega Supreme Holopsicon
Member
Many do not know of the full power of genetic engineering. In animals we see what is called metamorphosis. That is a radical transformation enabled by genetic programs. But it is not inconceivable that more gradual and less jarring transformations are beyond the power of advanced genetic engineering, where muscles and bone slowly change as well as organs.
Technology also presents the option of advanced tissue engineering, organ printing, as well as computer assisted surgery. It also opens the door to full body printing and brain transplants.
If technological progress continues to accelerate and it is not stopped by chaos, war or the end of the world, many options will open.
I think AGI, or True AI, once perfected, is the key to compressing centuries of progress into decades or years, that is the true nature of the singularity.
Progress must not be halted. Without this what have you? A short brutish life, of about 80 years, where 1/3rd to 1/2half is spent disease riddled and in decay?
A world without aging, where one is superhumanly smart, where one can learn anything at a moments notice.
And we have to remember that through advanced synthetic biology, it will be possible to design unevolvable nanostructures and molecular machines. Artificial skin, artificial bones, artificial muscles, artificial organs, the likes of which no animal has ever had. Bridging our technology with our biology at the molecular level, the true nanotechnology.
Trogdor1123
Gold Member
Except that none of us will be included in that. It will take moments for the to realize that it will quicker, easier, and cheaper for them to only do it for the next generation. Not the existing one. They will certainly not give up their advantage to take a massive advantage in the world. Heaven forbid they determine we are a bump in the road that needs to be removed.
I for one don't look forward to being a second rate citizen.
Omega Supreme Holopsicon
Member
This goes into the orthogonality thesis. Whether increased knowledge and intelligence will cause divergence or convergence in behavior.
I tend to assume that if my intellect and knowledge increases without bound I will converge towards ideal behavior. Some say it will be some random behavior, and no behavior is better, that unlimited knowledge and intelligence does not lead to better outcomes. We will see.
If there is convergence, it doesn't matter who or what does the increasing in capability, as they will move towards the ideal with the power to impose the ideal upon the unfit. If there is divergence, then yeah we're in for a rough ride.
In my view, the idea of orthogonality, basically is to say that goals cannot be compared in any meaningful sense. And that goal selection is outside the purview of intelligent action. But I would say, that I would expect a being with perfect intellect and omniscience to improve a world by their presence and actions, whatever they may be, the idea their actions are essentially random and their final pursuits are basically random pursuits, seems a bit problematic.
We humans can compare the goals and motives of others, and rank them, and select among them, and it does not seem this ability is based on arbitrary notions but what seem like objective notions. We can see that perhaps the guy who wants to cure cancer, and improve the lives of others, is perhaps in some sense aiming, especially if with the ability to do so, for something more noteworthy than the guy whose only aim is to keep himself staring at an empty road rocking back and forth in his porch rocking chair till he dies.
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Trogdor1123
Gold Member
Omega Supreme Holopsicon
Member
We will see what will happen. Within decades intelligence is expected to be solved. We will have machines that will have read all the works of man, and with capacity far beyond man's.
Maybe that spells doomsday, or maybe not.
Without progress we all have a timer and a death sentence nearby.
With progress we have the potential for full immersion virtual reality, full dive, brain computer interface. The ability to have any sensation or experience possible without it being immoral or wrong. We have the potential for attaining biological immortality, unlimited time. We have the potential for a world devoid of crime of untold security and prosperity where diseases and accidents are basically eliminated.
Progress must not be halted, it is the means towards an exit from the mundane reality of our present world.
Rentahamster
Rodent Whores
If you're still interested in this discussion, do you have any thoughts about my post here?
https://www.neogaf.com/threads/chin...jiankui-to-be-punished.1471338/post-253739434
Thurible
Member
My response here is going to be limited because I have to go do something soon.
You certainly raised some good points with the domesticated fruits and animals. Honestly I'm not 100% sure what to think of it as. Certainly human beings have directed the path these living creatures have gone. I could be wrong and evolution could be self directed. I'm just curious as to what domestication really does to a living thing and if it is truly an example of evolution. I will have to think about this long and hard and research the subject more, but I concede that you have made a pretty good point in your argument.
Rentahamster
Rodent Whores
As for dogs, they technically are still the same species as wolves since you can interbreed them and create viable offspring. However, that would have to also be directed by humans, since given their different behaviors, I doubt dogs and wolves have a high chance of mating in the wild due to their different behavior patterns.
Some examples of plants are more clear cut since many domesticated agricultural plants are sterile by design. They don't have seeds and must be propagated via cloning methods. If you research it though, you'll see that the ancestors of plants like corn, watermelon, spinach, broccoli, etc look much different today than they did before.
In terms of thinking if it's a true form of evolution, try to think of what evolution's definition is. What do you define it to be? Is it different than the dictionary definition?
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/evolution
Dontero
Banned
When you have glowing rats in lab the idea that someone edited genes of some human is not probable but certanity.
Like in case of an AI people who research that shit should be given first warning drop it until safety measures are in place if not off you go to prison.
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