I think that a discussion of eugenics is really a discussion of diversity, and the value thereof. We wouldn't want the whole world to be filled with identical people who have what we term the "best" genes because the complete lack of biodiversity would open us up to an isolation by a single disease, or especially vulnerable to a type of climate change, or simply leave us without people who will do better in a changing world than the "best" gene person will do in the world at the time of their birth. But that doesn't necessarily mean that all diversity is good. I think that when considering a hypothetical world where we have a very good understanding of and ability to manipulate the genome, would we want there to be people with x trait becomes a question of whether the diversity it adds to the gene pool is a net positive. If we could actually isolate the genes that lead to high IQs, for example, and could determine that changes to these genes only impact IQ, would there any reason not to give every person the highest IQ possible? Or returning to the topic that started this discussion, would there be a reason to let people be trans? Gay? It would be horrific to try and take these traits from people that exist now, since it is part of their identity and of who they are, but are there any evoiutionary advantages to these traits? What about skin color (assuming we can isolate skin color from other traits)? I would argue that things like skin color diversity don't actually provide menaingfuo diversity, and so there is no good reason to maintain them in the face of persistent racism. Better for everyone to be black or white or some wholly new race than to have meaningless differences which people use as a basis for discrimination IMO.
I think that a good reason to not make everyone as smart as possible is that there is a lot of important work out there that needs to be done in order for society to function, and a lot of very smart people would find a lot of that work incredibly unfulfilling. And if we assume genius janitors who have access to all your stuff when you're not around, I can only imagine that the combination of boredom, intelligence, and opportunity would lead to some serious shenanigans.
Well, IQ only measures your ability to do well on an IQ test, and we don't even have a definition of intelligence yet.
Genetic diversity is always good. I know that at this point of history we may think we are not at the mercy of natural selection anymore, but we may be in the future. And also who knows, a gene that gives you a lower IQ could also make you less likely to die of cancer. So there's that. Genes are just too complex to say "we are going to remove X trait and there will be no other consequences whatsoever". It's just not realistic.
Is all diversity good though? What is the value of Down's syndrome or trisomy x? Of huntington's disease?
What is the value of Sickle Cell Anemia?
Monocultures are bad.
Actually, the mutation that causes sickle cell anemia also provides a measure of immunity to malaria, IIRC.
It's two mutations (that cause sickle cell anemia) - you only need 1 to gain protection from malaria, and can live a relatively normal life with it.
The thing about the genetic diversity argument though is that it's so big picture as to be irrelevant for most people: whether or not the species survives kind of doesn't matter if I die. As a society we're really not ok with "every second person gets to live" as a survival strategy, which is what genetic diversity ultimately comes down to in this argument.
A better argument about the danger of wide-spread genetic engineering would focus on the tools we use to do it: the long term ramifications of the techniques and strategies we use to accomplish genetic engineering could introduce broad-ranging inheritable conditions which might manifest as something we can't easily cure with the same techniques by the time it happens.
To do GM you have to use restriction enzymes, restriction enzymes require specific DNA sequences which would mean you'd have many generations with common, easily known ones - and stable expression of the relevant genes would imply these sequences are being inherited like that.
If our tools don't improve (and currently they improve very slowly) then if that type of sequencing penetrated a critical mass of the population, we could be left with a legacy of its deficiencies for a very long time to come since undoing it would be practically impossible. For example, IVF has really only existed since 1978. Less then a generation - we have no actual idea what type of lives these people will live heading into old-age because literally no one has yet reached it.
Of course, all this really assumes that somehow it's suddenly everywhere all at once, which wealth disparity happily ensures it never would be. Its far more likely that genetic modification would take many decades before it gained acceptance, and we'd have a long heads up on any problems - and, the potential health problems don't really outweigh the real health problems we'd aim to cure, or what can happen to you due to just dumb luck. You might have good genes, but getting hit by a car will be just as deadly as ever.
The other thing - and I think this is a bigger one - is that ultimately I'm not sure there's all that much demand to run untested experimental technology on our children, rather then ourselves. The current technical arc implies that we'd be more likely to start implanted chimeric organs and tissue grown from stem cells in healthy adults in an effort to improve ourselves since it's far less problematic to develop from an ethical standpoint (and would be quicker and safer to do mass studies on) then genetically engineering fetus'.
I think that a discussion of eugenics is really a discussion of diversity, and the value thereof. We wouldn't want the whole world to be filled with identical people who have what we term the "best" genes because the complete lack of biodiversity would open us up to an isolation by a single disease, or especially vulnerable to a type of climate change, or simply leave us without people who will do better in a changing world than the "best" gene person will do in the world at the time of their birth. But that doesn't necessarily mean that all diversity is good. I think that when considering a hypothetical world where we have a very good understanding of and ability to manipulate the genome, would we want there to be people with x trait becomes a question of whether the diversity it adds to the gene pool is a net positive. If we could actually isolate the genes that lead to high IQs, for example, and could determine that changes to these genes only impact IQ, would there any reason not to give every person the highest IQ possible? Or returning to the topic that started this discussion, would there be a reason to let people be trans? Gay? It would be horrific to try and take these traits from people that exist now, since it is part of their identity and of who they are, but are there any evoiutionary advantages to these traits? What about skin color (assuming we can isolate skin color from other traits)? I would argue that things like skin color diversity don't actually provide menaingfuo diversity, and so there is no good reason to maintain them in the face of persistent racism. Better for everyone to be black or white or some wholly new race than to have meaningless differences which people use as a basis for discrimination IMO.
I think that a good reason to not make everyone as smart as possible is that there is a lot of important work out there that needs to be done in order for society to function, and a lot of very smart people would find a lot of that work incredibly unfulfilling. And if we assume genius janitors who have access to all your stuff when you're not around, I can only imagine that the combination of boredom, intelligence, and opportunity would lead to some serious shenanigans.
No, the issue with selecting for IQ is that IQ is a piss poor measure of mental ability that has a rather checkered history. We tend to be rather myopic when it comes to determining what "smart" actually means as a culture.
Well, IQ only measures your ability to do well on an IQ test, and we don't even have a definition of intelligence yet.
Genetic diversity is always good. I know that at this point of history we may think we are not at the mercy of natural selection anymore, but we may be in the future. And also who knows, a gene that gives you a lower IQ could also make you less likely to die of cancer. So there's that. Genes are just too complex to say "we are going to remove X trait and there will be no other consequences whatsoever". It's just not realistic.
Is all diversity good though? What is the value of Down's syndrome or trisomy x? Of huntington's disease?
What is the value of Sickle Cell Anemia?
Monocultures are bad.
Actually, the mutation that causes sickle cell anemia also provides a measure of immunity to malaria, IIRC.
....that was my point.
We slap a label on this as an illness because it has negative consequences most of the time but under certain conditions it is actually quite beneficial.
I am somewhat concerned that in our incomplete knowledge of these biological conditions we eliminate them and "clean" the human genome we'll be eliminating the variation that makes a species able to survive new conditions.
This makes me think. Is it worth keeping that genetic condition around for that purpose? There are other ways of dealing with malaria and how can we decide that instead of combating malaria in those ways, it is ok to allow humans to deal with the issues of sickle cell? When we look at genetics and their purpose we also have to consider outside factors, do we keep certain genetics even though it causes problems for the protection it gives to things we could prevent/remove in other ways?
This was originally specific to gender dysphoria but I suppose it generalizes pretty well.
How well does the following statement go over with some random person in the future?
"Gosh, I'm sorry about all the shit you've had to put up with over the past <time frame> dealing with <issue X> and we'd just like you to know that even though we could have corrected it in utero, we chose not too because it's good for society to have people like you around."
I think that a discussion of eugenics is really a discussion of diversity, and the value thereof. We wouldn't want the whole world to be filled with identical people who have what we term the "best" genes because the complete lack of biodiversity would open us up to an isolation by a single disease, or especially vulnerable to a type of climate change, or simply leave us without people who will do better in a changing world than the "best" gene person will do in the world at the time of their birth. But that doesn't necessarily mean that all diversity is good. I think that when considering a hypothetical world where we have a very good understanding of and ability to manipulate the genome, would we want there to be people with x trait becomes a question of whether the diversity it adds to the gene pool is a net positive. If we could actually isolate the genes that lead to high IQs, for example, and could determine that changes to these genes only impact IQ, would there any reason not to give every person the highest IQ possible? Or returning to the topic that started this discussion, would there be a reason to let people be trans? Gay? It would be horrific to try and take these traits from people that exist now, since it is part of their identity and of who they are, but are there any evoiutionary advantages to these traits? What about skin color (assuming we can isolate skin color from other traits)? I would argue that things like skin color diversity don't actually provide menaingfuo diversity, and so there is no good reason to maintain them in the face of persistent racism. Better for everyone to be black or white or some wholly new race than to have meaningless differences which people use as a basis for discrimination IMO.
I think that a good reason to not make everyone as smart as possible is that there is a lot of important work out there that needs to be done in order for society to function, and a lot of very smart people would find a lot of that work incredibly unfulfilling. And if we assume genius janitors who have access to all your stuff when you're not around, I can only imagine that the combination of boredom, intelligence, and opportunity would lead to some serious shenanigans.
No, the issue with selecting for IQ is that IQ is a piss poor measure of mental ability that has a rather checkered history. We tend to be rather myopic when it comes to determining what "smart" actually means as a culture.
You'll notice that I didn't mention IQ. I know the other fella did, and if your comment is meant for his edification, then carry on.
My point, which, despite the "No," you don't really seem to be addressing, is that even if it were possible to determine "what 'smart' actually means as a culture" it still would not be a good idea to make everyone as smart as possible.
People tend to identify with their mind and internal state to a far greater degree than their bodies. Changing your body to match your mind is one thing; transforming your inner self seems a lot scarier -- closer to death than mere modification.
From an outsider's standpoint it might make sense to say, "Whether we change your mind or your body what does it matter? Your problem will be fixed either way!" But to the individual you might as well be proposing to fix the pain of her toothache by killing her.
For people who already exist, sure. For people who don't, it's a choice between two hypothetical persons, neither of whom exists yet, and one has a toothache while the other does not. Why would you choose the toothache? If you inflicted it on a person who already existed that would be monstrous.
I find this an interesting but very difficult topic. For the sake of argument I'll say that disabled and 'born with a life expectancy of hours / days, in extreme suffering' are different things...but it still would have been a heart-wrenching and horrible thing to deal with. Disabled is a wide spectrum of things that will impact quality of life, but there is still a reasonable chance a person can live a happy meaningful life in spite of it - deaf, Downs, autism / aspergers, physical abnormalities, etc.
When it comes to individual parents choosing to abort a child they know will be born with a disability, I can't even imagine how difficult that decision must be. My wife and I talked about that quite a bit while she was pregnant with our daughter (her lab is in a hospital, so seeing sick kids is part of her day). We talked about going through with the pregnancy with few exceptions but I can't say how we would have decided if we found our daughter was actually going to be born disabled. It's a lot easier to deal with something like that as a theoretical. Judging someone for choosing something different than our theoretical choice is just wrong - we're pretty firmly pro-choice. Saying it's wrong in this case would literally be saying 'only moral abortion' argument.
When it comes to gene therapies and so-on, I realize we aren't even close to the point where we can reliably modify genes to produce the desired results. I'd say that - when we can do it - something that corrects major issues is pretty non-controversial. Off the top of my head, a gene therapy in a child that would be born with diabetes so they can produce insulin properly would be along those lines. Same thing with a gene therapy (if we could figure it out) that would prevent autism or significantly lessen the severity of it. Those are types of things that will pretty much universally and greatly improve someone's quality of life across the board.
Downs is...a funny one. Some of the happiest people I've ever met have had Downs, but the syndrome has a huge impact on quality of life and is very disruptive to the individuals. Also, my understanding of the nature of Downs is that unless you are doing IVF, by the point you are detecting it, it's not something that gene therapy is going to be able to fix until we're getting towards 'Starfleet' tech levels. It's also not something that could realistically be 'eradicated' simply because of the kind of mechanical error that it is. It's really something that I would have to punt on and fall back on the 'her body, her choice' and that everyone's experiences and needs are different.
Now, something curious that I want to bring up is that a lot of people seem opposed to gene modification for 'minor' issues. Eye color, hair color, etc. But what if there was a gene therapy that would guarantee everyone is going to have great teeth? It's something almost everyone of any means is going to want or get fixed anyways, so why not do it in the womb instead of making kids wear braces or whatever kids these days use. From there, what about height? There are real provable differences in income and happiness levels for short vs. tall people, so why wouldn't you fix this if you could and make sure your kid will be 6'3" or so... What about jacking up metabolism / turning down appetite so your kid doesn't have to deal with being fat or having body image disorders? Genetically perfect boobs in girls? After all, a lot of places boob jobs are something every girl of means gets, so why not avoid the potential cost and complications of surgery and do it 'naturally'?
It's pretty much the definition of a slippery slope, but when you look at places like Korea or China, where pretty much every kid of means is getting cosmetic surgery to fix their appearance, it's easy to make a compelling argument to avoid the risk and quality of life issues, and just do it all in the womb. And from there, intelligence (once we've got those gene combinations figured out), resistance to disease (wouldn't it be nice to know you are immune to HIV because of that Russian gene?) etc.
I could see this being something so highly demanded that we have Gattica, but it's not just something for the rich. It's something like prenatal vitamins today that everyone does. I'm not sure that's wrong. Maybe on a large scale, but not on an individual scale, and no raindrop caused the flood...
If the end result though is that around the world we've got healthier, happier, smarter people, isn't it a worthwhile goal? The transition might be a bit sucky, and there are risks, but I don't see this being something that the 'rich and famous' can keep to themselves. Once the science is worked out, it'll end up basic enough and it'll be in high enough demand that in one generation it'll be like someone flips a switch. I still don't know if this is a good thing, but I certainly don't think that suffering for the sake of suffering is good either.
This was originally specific to gender dysphoria but I suppose it generalizes pretty well.
How well does the following statement go over with some random person in the future?
"Gosh, I'm sorry about all the shit you've had to put up with over the past <time frame> dealing with <issue X> and we'd just like you to know that even though we could have corrected it in utero, we chose not too because it's good for society to have people like you around."
"Hey, man, I'm really sorry you had to put up with all that pesky racism for all your life, but don't worry. We are improving as a society and we have the solution to eliminate racism, all your children will be white by decree".
Although if sex dysphoria could be detected and sex changed during development (highly unlikely, but since we are all assuming things...) I would see nothing wrong with that, better now than later after years of hormonal treatment.
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HachfaceNot the Minister Farrakhan you're thinking ofDammit, Shepard!Registered Userregular
People tend to identify with their mind and internal state to a far greater degree than their bodies. Changing your body to match your mind is one thing; transforming your inner self seems a lot scarier -- closer to death than mere modification.
From an outsider's standpoint it might make sense to say, "Whether we change your mind or your body what does it matter? Your problem will be fixed either way!" But to the individual you might as well be proposing to fix the pain of her toothache by killing her.
For people who already exist, sure. For people who don't, it's a choice between two hypothetical persons, neither of whom exists yet, and one has a toothache while the other does not. Why would you choose the toothache? If you inflicted it on a person who already existed that would be monstrous.
The reason I posted my comment in the other thread was that I did not feel it particularly germane to this thread.
As far as this thread goes, sign me on to whatever @Feral is saying. I'm sure he's right.
This was originally specific to gender dysphoria but I suppose it generalizes pretty well.
How well does the following statement go over with some random person in the future?
"Gosh, I'm sorry about all the shit you've had to put up with over the past <time frame> dealing with <issue X> and we'd just like you to know that even though we could have corrected it in utero, we chose not too because it's good for society to have people like you around."
"Hey, man, I'm really sorry you had to put up with all that pesky racism for all your life, but don't worry. We are improving as a society and we have the solution to eliminate racism, all your children will be white by decree".
Well sure, if you think that being born with the "wrong" skin color is no different from, say, the "wrong" number of limbs. Maybe we can distinguish between Sneetch conditions and ones that are intrinsically unpleasant?
edit:
Although if sex dysphoria could be detected and sex changed during development (highly unlikely, but since we are all assuming things...) I would see nothing wrong with that, better now than later after years of hormonal treatment.
Wait. Would that mean you consider changing the brain to match the rest of the body, even prior to any significant neural activity, to be unconscionable too? Or is there a minimum age requirement for it to become a bad thing?
I don't see benign eugenics, defined as fixing defective genes, terrifying at all.
I wouldn't even consider this eugenics. It's very odd to see people discussing it as such.
Eugenics is generally considered to be the removal of "undesirable" traits from the gene pool, either through forced sterilization or execution. That's, you know, bad. Genetic medicine should really have some other term (and probably does.)
I think Gene Therapy is the preferred term (though i'm not sure)
The reason it's being discussed as Eugenics in this thread is because it's a spinoff of the GLBT thread where the trans individuals in the thread were comparing a hypothetical cure for gender dysphoria to Eugenics.
I don't see benign eugenics, defined as fixing defective genes, terrifying at all.
I wouldn't even consider this eugenics. It's very odd to see people discussing it as such.
Eugenics is generally considered to be the removal of "undesirable" traits from the gene pool, either through forced sterilization or execution. That's, you know, bad. Genetic medicine should really have some other term (and probably does.)
I know. I made that sme point on my first post in this thread, but people still seemed to consider it eugenics, so I just rolled with it.
@Tenek That's the thing, deciding exacly what's wrong. I know whatever SKFM says can't be considered a serious argument, but he was arguing that if people was getting upset about different skin colors, then why not eliminate all skin colors but one. Same with eyes or whatever other trait people are looking down upon.
Thing is, there may come a day when society thinks that homosexuality is a disease and people should be straightened in utero. So the tricky part is to decide what are legit medical conditions and what is harmless variability.
As for gender dysphoria, I don't understand what's the problem if we could detect it and change sex in time. Having the wrong gender identity (or the wrong body, depending on the angle) seems like a pretty big dieal to me, and trans people seem to be distressed by it.
I don't see benign eugenics, defined as fixing defective genes, terrifying at all.
I wouldn't even consider this eugenics. It's very odd to see people discussing it as such.
Eugenics is generally considered to be the removal of "undesirable" traits from the gene pool, either through forced sterilization or execution. That's, you know, bad. Genetic medicine should really have some other term (and probably does.)
I know. I made that sme point on my first post in this thread, but people still seemed to consider it eugenics, so I just rolled with it.
@Tenek That's the thing, deciding exacly what's wrong. I know whatever SKFM says can't be considered a serious argument, but he was arguing that if people was getting upset about different skin colors, then why not eliminate all skin colors but one. Same with eyes or whatever other trait people are looking down upon.
Thing is, there may come a day when society thinks that homosexuality is a disease and people should be straightened in utero. So the tricky part is to decide what are legit medical conditions and what is harmless variability.
But even if it's harmless, the decision is still up the mother on whether to abort or not, yes?
"Ms. Brown, we've determined the sex of your child. A girl. No visible defects. Congratulations!"
"My husband and I wanted a son to carry on the family name. Abort this one and we'll try again."
This was originally specific to gender dysphoria but I suppose it generalizes pretty well.
How well does the following statement go over with some random person in the future?
"Gosh, I'm sorry about all the shit you've had to put up with over the past <time frame> dealing with <issue X> and we'd just like you to know that even though we could have corrected it in utero, we chose not too because it's good for society to have people like you around."
"Hey, man, I'm really sorry you had to put up with all that pesky racism for all your life, but don't worry. We are improving as a society and we have the solution to eliminate racism, all your children will be white by decree".
Well sure, if you think that being born with the "wrong" skin color is no different from, say, the "wrong" number of limbs. Maybe we can distinguish between Sneetch conditions and ones that are intrinsically unpleasant?
edit:
Although if sex dysphoria could be detected and sex changed during development (highly unlikely, but since we are all assuming things...) I would see nothing wrong with that, better now than later after years of hormonal treatment.
Wait. Would that mean you consider changing the brain to match the rest of the body, even prior to any significant neural activity, to be unconscionable too? Or is there a minimum age requirement for it to become a bad thing?
Change the body to adjust to what the brain expects, change the brain to expect the "right" sex. I see no difference, honestly.
@emnmnme Sure, why not. I wouldn't do it and I consider it kind of reprehensible, but it's not my choice to make.
I don't see benign eugenics, defined as fixing defective genes, terrifying at all.
I wouldn't even consider this eugenics. It's very odd to see people discussing it as such.
Eugenics is generally considered to be the removal of "undesirable" traits from the gene pool, either through forced sterilization or execution. That's, you know, bad. Genetic medicine should really have some other term (and probably does.)
I know. I made that sme point on my first post in this thread, but people still seemed to consider it eugenics, so I just rolled with it.
@Tenek That's the thing, deciding exacly what's wrong. I know whatever SKFM says can't be considered a serious argument, but he was arguing that if people was getting upset about different skin colors, then why not eliminate all skin colors but one. Same with eyes or whatever other trait people are looking down upon.
Thing is, there may come a day when society thinks that homosexuality is a disease and people should be straightened in utero. So the tricky part is to decide what are legit medical conditions and what is harmless variability.
Yes, deciding which conditions are which is difficult. Well, sometimes. That doesn't mean you just throw up your hands and play Halo. One thing to consider might be how much of the unpleasantness is innate and how much is because of people being jerks. So, skin color is probably I'm Not Racist But... about, mm, 100% jerks. But something that is a massive drag on quality of life even if other people go out of their way to help you? Well, I don't want to live in Omelas either.
Actually, wouldn't we have to know a lot about something before getting rid of it? If the scenario is that we'd eventually be able to add or remove disorders at will, maybe it's not that big a deal. Maybe it won't ever get that easy, though.
I think that a discussion of eugenics is really a discussion of diversity, and the value thereof. We wouldn't want the whole world to be filled with identical people who have what we term the "best" genes because the complete lack of biodiversity would open us up to an isolation by a single disease, or especially vulnerable to a type of climate change, or simply leave us without people who will do better in a changing world than the "best" gene person will do in the world at the time of their birth. But that doesn't necessarily mean that all diversity is good. I think that when considering a hypothetical world where we have a very good understanding of and ability to manipulate the genome, would we want there to be people with x trait becomes a question of whether the diversity it adds to the gene pool is a net positive. If we could actually isolate the genes that lead to high IQs, for example, and could determine that changes to these genes only impact IQ, would there any reason not to give every person the highest IQ possible? Or returning to the topic that started this discussion, would there be a reason to let people be trans? Gay? It would be horrific to try and take these traits from people that exist now, since it is part of their identity and of who they are, but are there any evoiutionary advantages to these traits? What about skin color (assuming we can isolate skin color from other traits)? I would argue that things like skin color diversity don't actually provide menaingfuo diversity, and so there is no good reason to maintain them in the face of persistent racism. Better for everyone to be black or white or some wholly new race than to have meaningless differences which people use as a basis for discrimination IMO.
I think that a good reason to not make everyone as smart as possible is that there is a lot of important work out there that needs to be done in order for society to function, and a lot of very smart people would find a lot of that work incredibly unfulfilling. And if we assume genius janitors who have access to all your stuff when you're not around, I can only imagine that the combination of boredom, intelligence, and opportunity would lead to some serious shenanigans.
No, the issue with selecting for IQ is that IQ is a piss poor measure of mental ability that has a rather checkered history. We tend to be rather myopic when it comes to determining what "smart" actually means as a culture.
You'll notice that I didn't mention IQ. I know the other fella did, and if your comment is meant for his edification, then carry on.
My point, which, despite the "No," you don't really seem to be addressing, is that even if it were possible to determine "what 'smart' actually means as a culture" it still would not be a good idea to make everyone as smart as possible.
And my point is that the term "smart" is so loaded that you need to watch where you point it. While you may think you're avoiding any loading of cultural norms, in fact, your whole statement is fixated around a rather narrow view of intelligence that dovetails with cultural perceptions.
I don't see benign eugenics, defined as fixing defective genes, terrifying at all.
I wouldn't even consider this eugenics. It's very odd to see people discussing it as such.
Eugenics is generally considered to be the removal of "undesirable" traits from the gene pool, either through forced sterilization or execution. That's, you know, bad. Genetic medicine should really have some other term (and probably does.)
I know. I made that sme point on my first post in this thread, but people still seemed to consider it eugenics, so I just rolled with it.
Tenek That's the thing, deciding exacly what's wrong. I know whatever SKFM says can't be considered a serious argument, but he was arguing that if people was getting upset about different skin colors, then why not eliminate all skin colors but one. Same with eyes or whatever other trait people are looking down upon.
Thing is, there may come a day when society thinks that homosexuality is a disease and people should be straightened in utero. So the tricky part is to decide what are legit medical conditions and what is harmless variability.
But even if it's harmless, the decision is still up the mother on whether to abort or not, yes?
"Ms. Brown, we've determined the sex of your child. A girl. No visible defects. Congratulations!"
"My husband and I wanted a son to carry on the family name. Abort this one and we'll try again."
Well, option A is you don't care what the small number of weird decisions are. Option B would probably be three categories: Things you must change, things you may change, and things you may not change.
Well, IQ only measures your ability to do well on an IQ test, and we don't even have a definition of intelligence yet.
Genetic diversity is always good. I know that at this point of history we may think we are not at the mercy of natural selection anymore, but we may be in the future. And also who knows, a gene that gives you a lower IQ could also make you less likely to die of cancer. So there's that. Genes are just too complex to say "we are going to remove X trait and there will be no other consequences whatsoever". It's just not realistic.
Is all diversity good though? What is the value of Down's syndrome or trisomy x? Of huntington's disease?
No, not all diversity is good. But we should be very careful with what we consider "bad" diversity, and I'm my opinion it should be limited to things that result in severe disabilities for an individual. Diversity should never be reduces in the name of vague benefits for society, such as you said with skin color.
How come? Assume we can literally isolate the genes for eye color, and determine that eye color has nothing to do with vision at all, and we also have a persistent problem with people looking down on those with blue eyes. What is the argument for giving a "designer baby" in a world where all babies are designer blue eyes?
Because it's a stupid solution. If people are looking down on people with blue eyes then your problem are not the eyes, your problem is that your society is full of assholes and it's better to educate them than to remove their pet peeve of the century from the gene pool.
Because you will eventually run out of traits to remove, but assholes will never run out of stupid irrelevant stuff to discriminate against.
Diversity is good in itself, not only because it's a value like any other (or if not what's the point in having any animals if we just need chickens to eat?) and because genetic diversity will make genetic problems less common and will promote beneficial mutations. The benefits of "irrelevant" diversity may not be huge, but they are certainly much higher than the benefit of removing it, especially if we take the cost into account.
Also, I'm curious, how would you decide which skin or eye color should we remove? What if different countries decide different things? Now we will have a variety of genetically homogenous countries that will look down on each other. Good luck with that.
I mean, would you seriously defend that we should all dress in grey overalls because people look down on the way hipsters dress?
We can't end discrimination, but I suspect that we could lessen it a lot. I am much more confident in our ability to do this through science than through actually getting people to stop being racist. What is the intrinsic value in having one color of skin over another? I can't imagine that there is one, assuming we are able to literally isolate skin color from any other traits (a big assumption, I know, but necessary for the discussion).
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HachfaceNot the Minister Farrakhan you're thinking ofDammit, Shepard!Registered Userregular
In general it's probably a bad idea to solve cultural problems through biological methods.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
I find this an interesting but very difficult topic. For the sake of argument I'll say that disabled and 'born with a life expectancy of hours / days, in extreme suffering' are different things...but it still would have been a heart-wrenching and horrible thing to deal with. Disabled is a wide spectrum of things that will impact quality of life, but there is still a reasonable chance a person can live a happy meaningful life in spite of it - deaf, Downs, autism / aspergers, physical abnormalities, etc.
When it comes to individual parents choosing to abort a child they know will be born with a disability, I can't even imagine how difficult that decision must be. My wife and I talked about that quite a bit while she was pregnant with our daughter (her lab is in a hospital, so seeing sick kids is part of her day). We talked about going through with the pregnancy with few exceptions but I can't say how we would have decided if we found our daughter was actually going to be born disabled. It's a lot easier to deal with something like that as a theoretical. Judging someone for choosing something different than our theoretical choice is just wrong - we're pretty firmly pro-choice. Saying it's wrong in this case would literally be saying 'only moral abortion' argument.
When it comes to gene therapies and so-on, I realize we aren't even close to the point where we can reliably modify genes to produce the desired results. I'd say that - when we can do it - something that corrects major issues is pretty non-controversial. Off the top of my head, a gene therapy in a child that would be born with diabetes so they can produce insulin properly would be along those lines. Same thing with a gene therapy (if we could figure it out) that would prevent autism or significantly lessen the severity of it. Those are types of things that will pretty much universally and greatly improve someone's quality of life across the board.
Downs is...a funny one. Some of the happiest people I've ever met have had Downs, but the syndrome has a huge impact on quality of life and is very disruptive to the individuals. Also, my understanding of the nature of Downs is that unless you are doing IVF, by the point you are detecting it, it's not something that gene therapy is going to be able to fix until we're getting towards 'Starfleet' tech levels. It's also not something that could realistically be 'eradicated' simply because of the kind of mechanical error that it is. It's really something that I would have to punt on and fall back on the 'her body, her choice' and that everyone's experiences and needs are different.
Now, something curious that I want to bring up is that a lot of people seem opposed to gene modification for 'minor' issues. Eye color, hair color, etc. But what if there was a gene therapy that would guarantee everyone is going to have great teeth? It's something almost everyone of any means is going to want or get fixed anyways, so why not do it in the womb instead of making kids wear braces or whatever kids these days use. From there, what about height? There are real provable differences in income and happiness levels for short vs. tall people, so why wouldn't you fix this if you could and make sure your kid will be 6'3" or so... What about jacking up metabolism / turning down appetite so your kid doesn't have to deal with being fat or having body image disorders? Genetically perfect boobs in girls? After all, a lot of places boob jobs are something every girl of means gets, so why not avoid the potential cost and complications of surgery and do it 'naturally'?
It's pretty much the definition of a slippery slope, but when you look at places like Korea or China, where pretty much every kid of means is getting cosmetic surgery to fix their appearance, it's easy to make a compelling argument to avoid the risk and quality of life issues, and just do it all in the womb. And from there, intelligence (once we've got those gene combinations figured out), resistance to disease (wouldn't it be nice to know you are immune to HIV because of that Russian gene?) etc.
I could see this being something so highly demanded that we have Gattica, but it's not just something for the rich. It's something like prenatal vitamins today that everyone does. I'm not sure that's wrong. Maybe on a large scale, but not on an individual scale, and no raindrop caused the flood...
If the end result though is that around the world we've got healthier, happier, smarter people, isn't it a worthwhile goal? The transition might be a bit sucky, and there are risks, but I don't see this being something that the 'rich and famous' can keep to themselves. Once the science is worked out, it'll end up basic enough and it'll be in high enough demand that in one generation it'll be like someone flips a switch. I still don't know if this is a good thing, but I certainly don't think that suffering for the sake of suffering is good either.
I would go one step further. The efficiency gains are so great if we can resolve issues in utero instead of having people take costly medications for their entire lives that gene therapy may well be the only sensible use of our limited resources as a society. And even something that may seem trivial like height could yield incredible efficiency gains if we made it uniform (everything could be built in one size and fit everyone perfectly, machinery, furniture, etc. would all be the perfect design without any need for variations).
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Well, IQ only measures your ability to do well on an IQ test, and we don't even have a definition of intelligence yet.
Genetic diversity is always good. I know that at this point of history we may think we are not at the mercy of natural selection anymore, but we may be in the future. And also who knows, a gene that gives you a lower IQ could also make you less likely to die of cancer. So there's that. Genes are just too complex to say "we are going to remove X trait and there will be no other consequences whatsoever". It's just not realistic.
Is all diversity good though? What is the value of Down's syndrome or trisomy x? Of huntington's disease?
No, not all diversity is good. But we should be very careful with what we consider "bad" diversity, and I'm my opinion it should be limited to things that result in severe disabilities for an individual. Diversity should never be reduces in the name of vague benefits for society, such as you said with skin color.
How come? Assume we can literally isolate the genes for eye color, and determine that eye color has nothing to do with vision at all, and we also have a persistent problem with people looking down on those with blue eyes. What is the argument for giving a "designer baby" in a world where all babies are designer blue eyes?
Because it's a stupid solution. If people are looking down on people with blue eyes then your problem are not the eyes, your problem is that your society is full of assholes and it's better to educate them than to remove their pet peeve of the century from the gene pool.
Because you will eventually run out of traits to remove, but assholes will never run out of stupid irrelevant stuff to discriminate against.
Diversity is good in itself, not only because it's a value like any other (or if not what's the point in having any animals if we just need chickens to eat?) and because genetic diversity will make genetic problems less common and will promote beneficial mutations. The benefits of "irrelevant" diversity may not be huge, but they are certainly much higher than the benefit of removing it, especially if we take the cost into account.
Also, I'm curious, how would you decide which skin or eye color should we remove? What if different countries decide different things? Now we will have a variety of genetically homogenous countries that will look down on each other. Good luck with that.
I mean, would you seriously defend that we should all dress in grey overalls because people look down on the way hipsters dress?
We can't end discrimination, but I suspect that we could lessen it a lot. I am much more confident in our ability to do this through science than through actually getting people to stop being racist. What is the intrinsic value in having one color of skin over another? I can't imagine that there is one, assuming we are able to literally isolate skin color from any other traits (a big assumption, I know, but necessary for the discussion).
For some of us diversity has an intrinsic value. Same as having different clothes to choose from has an intrinsic value, same that having different foods to eat that are not Soylent Green has an intrinsic value.
Maybe you don't find they have that value, that's ok. Still, good luck convincing people to change their children's skin color for the stability of the country.
I mean, if racist people have problems with the existence of people with other skin colors, imagine the problems they would have with raising a black kid. Unless you want all blacks to have white children because there is racist white people.
I mean, it's easy to see how this non-solution creates more problems than it solves.
Sure, why not. I wouldn't do it and I consider it kind of reprehensible, but it's not my choice to make.
So you're saying that while we should encourage genetic diversity and educate the public, it's not necessary to place legal protections on genes to prevent discrimination, right?
Somehow, parents going "I want blue eyes because green is a stupid colour" is more appealing to me than the state going "this is the kingdom of blue eyes, no green eyes allowed."
I think that a discussion of eugenics is really a discussion of diversity, and the value thereof. We wouldn't want the whole world to be filled with identical people who have what we term the "best" genes because the complete lack of biodiversity would open us up to an isolation by a single disease, or especially vulnerable to a type of climate change, or simply leave us without people who will do better in a changing world than the "best" gene person will do in the world at the time of their birth. But that doesn't necessarily mean that all diversity is good. I think that when considering a hypothetical world where we have a very good understanding of and ability to manipulate the genome, would we want there to be people with x trait becomes a question of whether the diversity it adds to the gene pool is a net positive. If we could actually isolate the genes that lead to high IQs, for example, and could determine that changes to these genes only impact IQ, would there any reason not to give every person the highest IQ possible? Or returning to the topic that started this discussion, would there be a reason to let people be trans? Gay? It would be horrific to try and take these traits from people that exist now, since it is part of their identity and of who they are, but are there any evoiutionary advantages to these traits? What about skin color (assuming we can isolate skin color from other traits)? I would argue that things like skin color diversity don't actually provide menaingfuo diversity, and so there is no good reason to maintain them in the face of persistent racism. Better for everyone to be black or white or some wholly new race than to have meaningless differences which people use as a basis for discrimination IMO.
I think that a good reason to not make everyone as smart as possible is that there is a lot of important work out there that needs to be done in order for society to function, and a lot of very smart people would find a lot of that work incredibly unfulfilling. And if we assume genius janitors who have access to all your stuff when you're not around, I can only imagine that the combination of boredom, intelligence, and opportunity would lead to some serious shenanigans.
No, the issue with selecting for IQ is that IQ is a piss poor measure of mental ability that has a rather checkered history. We tend to be rather myopic when it comes to determining what "smart" actually means as a culture.
You'll notice that I didn't mention IQ. I know the other fella did, and if your comment is meant for his edification, then carry on.
My point, which, despite the "No," you don't really seem to be addressing, is that even if it were possible to determine "what 'smart' actually means as a culture" it still would not be a good idea to make everyone as smart as possible.
And my point is that the term "smart" is so loaded that you need to watch where you point it. While you may think you're avoiding any loading of cultural norms, in fact, your whole statement is fixated around a rather narrow view of intelligence that dovetails with cultural perceptions.
Yes. That's not really relevant to the notion that if you were to give everyone the same skills in a world where only a portion of those people could exercise those skills in a productive and personally fulfilling way, it seems likely that some of the people who found themselves without a legitimate and fulfilling outlet would exercise those skills in destructive or otherwise problematic ways. It doesn't really matter what exactly that bundle of skills contains, or what label you attach to it.
Well, IQ only measures your ability to do well on an IQ test, and we don't even have a definition of intelligence yet.
Genetic diversity is always good. I know that at this point of history we may think we are not at the mercy of natural selection anymore, but we may be in the future. And also who knows, a gene that gives you a lower IQ could also make you less likely to die of cancer. So there's that. Genes are just too complex to say "we are going to remove X trait and there will be no other consequences whatsoever". It's just not realistic.
Is all diversity good though? What is the value of Down's syndrome or trisomy x? Of huntington's disease?
No, not all diversity is good. But we should be very careful with what we consider "bad" diversity, and I'm my opinion it should be limited to things that result in severe disabilities for an individual. Diversity should never be reduces in the name of vague benefits for society, such as you said with skin color.
How come? Assume we can literally isolate the genes for eye color, and determine that eye color has nothing to do with vision at all, and we also have a persistent problem with people looking down on those with blue eyes. What is the argument for giving a "designer baby" in a world where all babies are designer blue eyes?
Because it's a stupid solution. If people are looking down on people with blue eyes then your problem are not the eyes, your problem is that your society is full of assholes and it's better to educate them than to remove their pet peeve of the century from the gene pool.
Because you will eventually run out of traits to remove, but assholes will never run out of stupid irrelevant stuff to discriminate against.
Diversity is good in itself, not only because it's a value like any other (or if not what's the point in having any animals if we just need chickens to eat?) and because genetic diversity will make genetic problems less common and will promote beneficial mutations. The benefits of "irrelevant" diversity may not be huge, but they are certainly much higher than the benefit of removing it, especially if we take the cost into account.
Also, I'm curious, how would you decide which skin or eye color should we remove? What if different countries decide different things? Now we will have a variety of genetically homogenous countries that will look down on each other. Good luck with that.
I mean, would you seriously defend that we should all dress in grey overalls because people look down on the way hipsters dress?
We can't end discrimination, but I suspect that we could lessen it a lot. I am much more confident in our ability to do this through science than through actually getting people to stop being racist.
What experiences have you had that led you to this conclusion? Did science give you the Civil Rights Act? Gay marriage? Was the success of the women's suffrage movement a scientific development?
Sure, why not. I wouldn't do it and I consider it kind of reprehensible, but it's not my choice to make.
So you're saying that while we should encourage genetic diversity and educate the public, it's not necessary to place legal protections on genes to prevent discrimination, right?
I was talking about abortion. Genetic modification for aesthetic purposes has the problem that is made on another non-consenting person. The problem here, is, do you have the right to do that to a kid if it's not solving a legit medical condition? For me it's like naming your kid "Dick McBalls" times one thousand.
As for the "legal protections of genes" I don't know where are you trying to get to, perhaps if you elaborate on your argument instead of stringing me along with questions the discussion will be more productive.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
I think that a discussion of eugenics is really a discussion of diversity, and the value thereof. We wouldn't want the whole world to be filled with identical people who have what we term the "best" genes because the complete lack of biodiversity would open us up to an isolation by a single disease, or especially vulnerable to a type of climate change, or simply leave us without people who will do better in a changing world than the "best" gene person will do in the world at the time of their birth. But that doesn't necessarily mean that all diversity is good. I think that when considering a hypothetical world where we have a very good understanding of and ability to manipulate the genome, would we want there to be people with x trait becomes a question of whether the diversity it adds to the gene pool is a net positive. If we could actually isolate the genes that lead to high IQs, for example, and could determine that changes to these genes only impact IQ, would there any reason not to give every person the highest IQ possible? Or returning to the topic that started this discussion, would there be a reason to let people be trans? Gay? It would be horrific to try and take these traits from people that exist now, since it is part of their identity and of who they are, but are there any evoiutionary advantages to these traits? What about skin color (assuming we can isolate skin color from other traits)? I would argue that things like skin color diversity don't actually provide menaingfuo diversity, and so there is no good reason to maintain them in the face of persistent racism. Better for everyone to be black or white or some wholly new race than to have meaningless differences which people use as a basis for discrimination IMO.
I think that a good reason to not make everyone as smart as possible is that there is a lot of important work out there that needs to be done in order for society to function, and a lot of very smart people would find a lot of that work incredibly unfulfilling. And if we assume genius janitors who have access to all your stuff when you're not around, I can only imagine that the combination of boredom, intelligence, and opportunity would lead to some serious shenanigans.
No, the issue with selecting for IQ is that IQ is a piss poor measure of mental ability that has a rather checkered history. We tend to be rather myopic when it comes to determining what "smart" actually means as a culture.
You'll notice that I didn't mention IQ. I know the other fella did, and if your comment is meant for his edification, then carry on.
My point, which, despite the "No," you don't really seem to be addressing, is that even if it were possible to determine "what 'smart' actually means as a culture" it still would not be a good idea to make everyone as smart as possible.
And my point is that the term "smart" is so loaded that you need to watch where you point it. While you may think you're avoiding any loading of cultural norms, in fact, your whole statement is fixated around a rather narrow view of intelligence that dovetails with cultural perceptions.
Yes. That's not really relevant to the notion that if you were to give everyone the same skills in a world where only a portion of those people could exercise those skills in a productive and personally fulfilling way, it seems likely that some of the people who found themselves without a legitimate and fulfilling outlet would exercise those skills in destructive or otherwise problematic ways. It doesn't really matter what exactly that bundle of skills contains, or what label you attach to it.
Betas and Deltas are happy, right? I've often thought that the only problem with Brave New World was the Alpha's had too many chances to be unhappy.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Well, IQ only measures your ability to do well on an IQ test, and we don't even have a definition of intelligence yet.
Genetic diversity is always good. I know that at this point of history we may think we are not at the mercy of natural selection anymore, but we may be in the future. And also who knows, a gene that gives you a lower IQ could also make you less likely to die of cancer. So there's that. Genes are just too complex to say "we are going to remove X trait and there will be no other consequences whatsoever". It's just not realistic.
Is all diversity good though? What is the value of Down's syndrome or trisomy x? Of huntington's disease?
No, not all diversity is good. But we should be very careful with what we consider "bad" diversity, and I'm my opinion it should be limited to things that result in severe disabilities for an individual. Diversity should never be reduces in the name of vague benefits for society, such as you said with skin color.
How come? Assume we can literally isolate the genes for eye color, and determine that eye color has nothing to do with vision at all, and we also have a persistent problem with people looking down on those with blue eyes. What is the argument for giving a "designer baby" in a world where all babies are designer blue eyes?
Because it's a stupid solution. If people are looking down on people with blue eyes then your problem are not the eyes, your problem is that your society is full of assholes and it's better to educate them than to remove their pet peeve of the century from the gene pool.
Because you will eventually run out of traits to remove, but assholes will never run out of stupid irrelevant stuff to discriminate against.
Diversity is good in itself, not only because it's a value like any other (or if not what's the point in having any animals if we just need chickens to eat?) and because genetic diversity will make genetic problems less common and will promote beneficial mutations. The benefits of "irrelevant" diversity may not be huge, but they are certainly much higher than the benefit of removing it, especially if we take the cost into account.
Also, I'm curious, how would you decide which skin or eye color should we remove? What if different countries decide different things? Now we will have a variety of genetically homogenous countries that will look down on each other. Good luck with that.
I mean, would you seriously defend that we should all dress in grey overalls because people look down on the way hipsters dress?
We can't end discrimination, but I suspect that we could lessen it a lot. I am much more confident in our ability to do this through science than through actually getting people to stop being racist.
What experiences have you had that led you to this conclusion? Did science give you the Civil Rights Act? Gay marriage? Was the success of the women's suffrage movement a scientific development?
Have we ended discrimination against any of those groups?
And for the people cheering diversity for diversity's sake, would you support affirmative action based on eye color?
Well, IQ only measures your ability to do 6well on an IQ test, and we don't even have a definition of intelligence yet.
Genetic diversity is always good. I know that at this point of history we may think we are not at the mercy of natural selection anymore, but we may be in the future. And also who knows, a gene that gives you a lower IQ could also make you less likely to die of cancer. So there's that. Genes are just too complex to say "we are going to remove X trait and there will be no other consequences whatsoever". It's just not realistic.
Is all diversity good though? What is the value of Down's syndrome or trisomy x? Of huntington's disease?
No, not all diversity is good. But we should be very careful with what we consider "bad" diversity, and I'm my opinion it should be limited to things that result in severe disabilities for an individual. Diversity should never be reduces in the name of vague benefits for society, such as you said with skin color.
How come? Assume we can literally isolate the genes for eye color, and determine that eye color has nothing to do with vision at all, and we also have a persistent problem with people looking down on those with blue eyes. What is the argument for giving a "designer baby" in a world where all babies are designer blue eyes?
Because it's a stupid solution. If people are looking down on people with blue eyes then your problem are not the eyes, your problem is that your society is full of assholes and it's better to educate them than to remove their pet peeve of the century from the gene pool.
Because you will eventually run out of traits to remove, but assholes will never run out of stupid irrelevant stuff to discriminate against.
Diversity is good in itself, not only because it's a value like any other (or if not what's the point in having any animals if we just need chickens to eat?) and because genetic diversity will make genetic problems less common and will promote beneficial mutations. The benefits of "irrelevant" diversity may not be huge, but they are certainly much higher than the benefit of removing it, especially if we take the cost into account.
Also, I'm curious, how would you decide which skin or eye color should we remove? What if different countries decide different things? Now we will have a variety of genetically homogenous countries that will look down on each other. Good luck with that.
I mean, would you seriously defend that we should all dress in grey overalls because people look down on the way hipsters dress?
We can't end discrimination, but I suspect that we could lessen it a lot. I am much more confident in our ability to do this through science than through actually getting people to stop being racist. What is the intrinsic value in having one color of skin over another? I can't imagine that there is one, assuming we are able to literally isolate skin color from any other traits (a big assumption, I know, but necessary for the discussion).
For some of us diversity has an intrinsic value. Same as having different clothes to choose from has an intrinsic value, same that having different foods to eat that are not Soylent Green has an intrinsic value.
Maybe you don't find they have that value, that's ok. Still, good luck convincing people to change their children's skin color for the stability of the country.
I mean, if racist people have problems with the existence of people with other skin colors, imagine the problems they would have with raising a black kid. Unless you want all blacks to have white children because there is racist white people.
I mean, it's easy to see how this non-solution creates more problems than it solves.
What is the intrinsic value of skin color diversity? I'm not talking about the value of having people of different races that live in different cultures/subcultures now. I'm asking what would be lost if all of a sudden all people became blue.
Well, IQ only measures your ability to do well on an IQ test, and we don't even have a definition of intelligence yet.
Genetic diversity is always good. I know that at this point of history we may think we are not at the mercy of natural selection anymore, but we may be in the future. And also who knows, a gene that gives you a lower IQ could also make you less likely to die of cancer. So there's that. Genes are just too complex to say "we are going to remove X trait and there will be no other consequences whatsoever". It's just not realistic.
Is all diversity good though? What is the value of Down's syndrome or trisomy x? Of huntington's disease?
No, not all diversity is good. But we should be very careful with what we consider "bad" diversity, and I'm my opinion it should be limited to things that result in severe disabilities for an individual. Diversity should never be reduces in the name of vague benefits for society, such as you said with skin color.
How come? Assume we can literally isolate the genes for eye color, and determine that eye color has nothing to do with vision at all, and we also have a persistent problem with people looking down on those with blue eyes. What is the argument for giving a "designer baby" in a world where all babies are designer blue eyes?
Because it's a stupid solution. If people are looking down on people with blue eyes then your problem are not the eyes, your problem is that your society is full of assholes and it's better to educate them than to remove their pet peeve of the century from the gene pool.
Because you will eventually run out of traits to remove, but assholes will never run out of stupid irrelevant stuff to discriminate against.
Diversity is good in itself, not only because it's a value like any other (or if not what's the point in having any animals if we just need chickens to eat?) and because genetic diversity will make genetic problems less common and will promote beneficial mutations. The benefits of "irrelevant" diversity may not be huge, but they are certainly much higher than the benefit of removing it, especially if we take the cost into account.
Also, I'm curious, how would you decide which skin or eye color should we remove? What if different countries decide different things? Now we will have a variety of genetically homogenous countries that will look down on each other. Good luck with that.
I mean, would you seriously defend that we should all dress in grey overalls because people look down on the way hipsters dress?
We can't end discrimination, but I suspect that we could lessen it a lot. I am much more confident in our ability to do this through science than through actually getting people to stop being racist.
What experiences have you had that led you to this conclusion? Did science give you the Civil Rights Act? Gay marriage? Was the success of the women's suffrage movement a scientific development?
Have we ended discrimination against any of those groups?
And for the people cheering diversity for diversity's sake, would you support affirmative action based on eye color?
How do we get from "not eliminating all eye colors but one" to "affirmative action based on eye color"?
Since we are playing the game of questions:
What inherent value is there in eating a variety of foods instead of the same nutritious green goo every day?
Well, IQ only measures your ability to do well on an IQ test, and we don't even have a definition of intelligence yet.
Genetic diversity is always good. I know that at this point of history we may think we are not at the mercy of natural selection anymore, but we may be in the future. And also who knows, a gene that gives you a lower IQ could also make you less likely to die of cancer. So there's that. Genes are just too complex to say "we are going to remove X trait and there will be no other consequences whatsoever". It's just not realistic.
Is all diversity good though? What is the value of Down's syndrome or trisomy x? Of huntington's disease?
No, not all diversity is good. But we should be very careful with what we consider "bad" diversity, and I'm my opinion it should be limited to things that result in severe disabilities for an individual. Diversity should never be reduces in the name of vague benefits for society, such as you said with skin color.
How come? Assume we can literally isolate the genes for eye color, and determine that eye color has nothing to do with vision at all, and we also have a persistent problem with people looking down on those with blue eyes. What is the argument for giving a "designer baby" in a world where all babies are designer blue eyes?
Because it's a stupid solution. If people are looking down on people with blue eyes then your problem are not the eyes, your problem is that your society is full of assholes and it's better to educate them than to remove their pet peeve of the century from the gene pool.
Because you will eventually run out of traits to remove, but assholes will never run out of stupid irrelevant stuff to discriminate against.
Diversity is good in itself, not only because it's a value like any other (or if not what's the point in having any animals if we just need chickens to eat?) and because genetic diversity will make genetic problems less common and will promote beneficial mutations. The benefits of "irrelevant" diversity may not be huge, but they are certainly much higher than the benefit of removing it, especially if we take the cost into account.
Also, I'm curious, how would you decide which skin or eye color should we remove? What if different countries decide different things? Now we will have a variety of genetically homogenous countries that will look down on each other. Good luck with that.
I mean, would you seriously defend that we should all dress in grey overalls because people look down on the way hipsters dress?
We can't end discrimination, but I suspect that we could lessen it a lot. I am much more confident in our ability to do this through science than through actually getting people to stop being racist.
What experiences have you had that led you to this conclusion? Did science give you the Civil Rights Act? Gay marriage? Was the success of the women's suffrage movement a scientific development?
Have we ended discrimination against any of those groups?
So is your position that we should abandon a consistently effective process with slow but proven results in favour of an untested (in this arena) process with no successes to date (in this arena)?
I think that a discussion of eugenics is really a discussion of diversity, and the value thereof. We wouldn't want the whole world to be filled with identical people who have what we term the "best" genes because the complete lack of biodiversity would open us up to an isolation by a single disease, or especially vulnerable to a type of climate change, or simply leave us without people who will do better in a changing world than the "best" gene person will do in the world at the time of their birth. But that doesn't necessarily mean that all diversity is good. I think that when considering a hypothetical world where we have a very good understanding of and ability to manipulate the genome, would we want there to be people with x trait becomes a question of whether the diversity it adds to the gene pool is a net positive. If we could actually isolate the genes that lead to high IQs, for example, and could determine that changes to these genes only impact IQ, would there any reason not to give every person the highest IQ possible? Or returning to the topic that started this discussion, would there be a reason to let people be trans? Gay? It would be horrific to try and take these traits from people that exist now, since it is part of their identity and of who they are, but are there any evoiutionary advantages to these traits? What about skin color (assuming we can isolate skin color from other traits)? I would argue that things like skin color diversity don't actually provide menaingfuo diversity, and so there is no good reason to maintain them in the face of persistent racism. Better for everyone to be black or white or some wholly new race than to have meaningless differences which people use as a basis for discrimination IMO.
There's the assumption here that modifying genetics would necessarily lead to less diversity. Something like Gattaca, where apparently every single person decides to optimize for dullness and a fondness for formalwear. But it could also be possible for the reverse to be true in some cases, for such a process to result in increased diversity. Introducing novel traits, or ones not commonly present in the human population. Different people making different choices, where there's different potential outcomes or tradeoffs or ideas of what is good. And also, things like IQ aren't so simply controlled or determined, it's building a coherent whole, and the effect that a single gene allele has, might depend on what allele is present for a number of other genes. We have found a number of genes, that together could potentially add up to a modest IQ boost, but it's often hard to test. And intelligence isn't a single number, something that might improve it in one aspect, might be detrimental in another. So even if we have the knowledge, there could be trade-offs involved.
And if you can find gene alleles that determine if someone is gay (or change the propensity a bit), you'll have people who try to take them out, but you'll also have people who try to put them in. It seems like you might end up with the case where you're not likely to end up with conformity, unless you started out with conformity. (Or unless you have a government mandating certain changes, or allowing one but not the other, etc.)
What about skin color (assuming we can isolate skin color from other traits)? I would argue that things like skin color diversity don't actually provide menaingfuo diversity, and so there is no good reason to maintain them in the face of persistent racism. Better for everyone to be black or white or some wholly new race than to have meaningless differences which people use as a basis for discrimination IMO.
Better yet, see if you can find genes for a propensity for racism, desire for conformity, xenophobia, etc., and remove them. Besides, if you're going for practical, go with color changing skin, light if you're low on vitamin-d, or in the shade for a while, that changes to darker if you're good on vitamin-d or have been in the sun for a while. If you're going more artistic, you could try some blues or greens for a change, or add some Luciferase?
Or say for example, what if a couple decides to have kids with Hypertrichosis? That may be controversial, but it's not harmful in itself, there may be arguments that they would be discriminated against, but those sorts of arguments could also apply toward going with anything but straight white male.
I think that a discussion of eugenics is really a discussion of diversity, and the value thereof. We wouldn't want the whole world to be filled with identical people who have what we term the "best" genes because the complete lack of biodiversity would open us up to an isolation by a single disease, or especially vulnerable to a type of climate change, or simply leave us without people who will do better in a changing world than the "best" gene person will do in the world at the time of their birth. But that doesn't necessarily mean that all diversity is good. I think that when considering a hypothetical world where we have a very good understanding of and ability to manipulate the genome, would we want there to be people with x trait becomes a question of whether the diversity it adds to the gene pool is a net positive. If we could actually isolate the genes that lead to high IQs, for example, and could determine that changes to these genes only impact IQ, would there any reason not to give every person the highest IQ possible? Or returning to the topic that started this discussion, would there be a reason to let people be trans? Gay? It would be horrific to try and take these traits from people that exist now, since it is part of their identity and of who they are, but are there any evoiutionary advantages to these traits? What about skin color (assuming we can isolate skin color from other traits)? I would argue that things like skin color diversity don't actually provide menaingfuo diversity, and so there is no good reason to maintain them in the face of persistent racism. Better for everyone to be black or white or some wholly new race than to have meaningless differences which people use as a basis for discrimination IMO.
I think that a good reason to not make everyone as smart as possible is that there is a lot of important work out there that needs to be done in order for society to function, and a lot of very smart people would find a lot of that work incredibly unfulfilling. And if we assume genius janitors who have access to all your stuff when you're not around, I can only imagine that the combination of boredom, intelligence, and opportunity would lead to some serious shenanigans.
No, the issue with selecting for IQ is that IQ is a piss poor measure of mental ability that has a rather checkered history. We tend to be rather myopic when it comes to determining what "smart" actually means as a culture.
You'll notice that I didn't mention IQ. I know the other fella did, and if your comment is meant for his edification, then carry on.
My point, which, despite the "No," you don't really seem to be addressing, is that even if it were possible to determine "what 'smart' actually means as a culture" it still would not be a good idea to make everyone as smart as possible.
And my point is that the term "smart" is so loaded that you need to watch where you point it. While you may think you're avoiding any loading of cultural norms, in fact, your whole statement is fixated around a rather narrow view of intelligence that dovetails with cultural perceptions.
Yes. That's not really relevant to the notion that if you were to give everyone the same skills in a world where only a portion of those people could exercise those skills in a productive and personally fulfilling way, it seems likely that some of the people who found themselves without a legitimate and fulfilling outlet would exercise those skills in destructive or otherwise problematic ways. It doesn't really matter what exactly that bundle of skills contains, or what label you attach to it.
You know this all presumes that it's easy to eliminate some traits, or that people wouldn't rebel simply because they could. But also, you're using efficient in a weird "efficient with emotion" sense.
Think better:
Efficient would be encode everyone so that their melatonin levels were much more dynamically responsive to their ambient light exposure. If you could turn dark skinned in the course of an hour in the sun, then it'd be incredibly helpful for adapting to different climates. Add a vitamin D moderator so that you would lighten to improve vitamin D exposure, and maybe some triggers linked to the DNA repair machinery so you'd darken rapidly before sunburning. This would help people who are currently stuck with a fixed skin color enormously.
That's efficiency. And to boot we've eliminated racism because it would literally not make sense any more.
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I think that a good reason to not make everyone as smart as possible is that there is a lot of important work out there that needs to be done in order for society to function, and a lot of very smart people would find a lot of that work incredibly unfulfilling. And if we assume genius janitors who have access to all your stuff when you're not around, I can only imagine that the combination of boredom, intelligence, and opportunity would lead to some serious shenanigans.
It's two mutations (that cause sickle cell anemia) - you only need 1 to gain protection from malaria, and can live a relatively normal life with it.
The thing about the genetic diversity argument though is that it's so big picture as to be irrelevant for most people: whether or not the species survives kind of doesn't matter if I die. As a society we're really not ok with "every second person gets to live" as a survival strategy, which is what genetic diversity ultimately comes down to in this argument.
A better argument about the danger of wide-spread genetic engineering would focus on the tools we use to do it: the long term ramifications of the techniques and strategies we use to accomplish genetic engineering could introduce broad-ranging inheritable conditions which might manifest as something we can't easily cure with the same techniques by the time it happens.
To do GM you have to use restriction enzymes, restriction enzymes require specific DNA sequences which would mean you'd have many generations with common, easily known ones - and stable expression of the relevant genes would imply these sequences are being inherited like that.
If our tools don't improve (and currently they improve very slowly) then if that type of sequencing penetrated a critical mass of the population, we could be left with a legacy of its deficiencies for a very long time to come since undoing it would be practically impossible. For example, IVF has really only existed since 1978. Less then a generation - we have no actual idea what type of lives these people will live heading into old-age because literally no one has yet reached it.
Of course, all this really assumes that somehow it's suddenly everywhere all at once, which wealth disparity happily ensures it never would be. Its far more likely that genetic modification would take many decades before it gained acceptance, and we'd have a long heads up on any problems - and, the potential health problems don't really outweigh the real health problems we'd aim to cure, or what can happen to you due to just dumb luck. You might have good genes, but getting hit by a car will be just as deadly as ever.
The other thing - and I think this is a bigger one - is that ultimately I'm not sure there's all that much demand to run untested experimental technology on our children, rather then ourselves. The current technical arc implies that we'd be more likely to start implanted chimeric organs and tissue grown from stem cells in healthy adults in an effort to improve ourselves since it's far less problematic to develop from an ethical standpoint (and would be quicker and safer to do mass studies on) then genetically engineering fetus'.
No, the issue with selecting for IQ is that IQ is a piss poor measure of mental ability that has a rather checkered history. We tend to be rather myopic when it comes to determining what "smart" actually means as a culture.
This makes me think. Is it worth keeping that genetic condition around for that purpose? There are other ways of dealing with malaria and how can we decide that instead of combating malaria in those ways, it is ok to allow humans to deal with the issues of sickle cell? When we look at genetics and their purpose we also have to consider outside factors, do we keep certain genetics even though it causes problems for the protection it gives to things we could prevent/remove in other ways?
How well does the following statement go over with some random person in the future?
"Gosh, I'm sorry about all the shit you've had to put up with over the past <time frame> dealing with <issue X> and we'd just like you to know that even though we could have corrected it in utero, we chose not too because it's good for society to have people like you around."
You'll notice that I didn't mention IQ. I know the other fella did, and if your comment is meant for his edification, then carry on.
My point, which, despite the "No," you don't really seem to be addressing, is that even if it were possible to determine "what 'smart' actually means as a culture" it still would not be a good idea to make everyone as smart as possible.
@Hachface
For people who already exist, sure. For people who don't, it's a choice between two hypothetical persons, neither of whom exists yet, and one has a toothache while the other does not. Why would you choose the toothache? If you inflicted it on a person who already existed that would be monstrous.
When it comes to individual parents choosing to abort a child they know will be born with a disability, I can't even imagine how difficult that decision must be. My wife and I talked about that quite a bit while she was pregnant with our daughter (her lab is in a hospital, so seeing sick kids is part of her day). We talked about going through with the pregnancy with few exceptions but I can't say how we would have decided if we found our daughter was actually going to be born disabled. It's a lot easier to deal with something like that as a theoretical. Judging someone for choosing something different than our theoretical choice is just wrong - we're pretty firmly pro-choice. Saying it's wrong in this case would literally be saying 'only moral abortion' argument.
When it comes to gene therapies and so-on, I realize we aren't even close to the point where we can reliably modify genes to produce the desired results. I'd say that - when we can do it - something that corrects major issues is pretty non-controversial. Off the top of my head, a gene therapy in a child that would be born with diabetes so they can produce insulin properly would be along those lines. Same thing with a gene therapy (if we could figure it out) that would prevent autism or significantly lessen the severity of it. Those are types of things that will pretty much universally and greatly improve someone's quality of life across the board.
Downs is...a funny one. Some of the happiest people I've ever met have had Downs, but the syndrome has a huge impact on quality of life and is very disruptive to the individuals. Also, my understanding of the nature of Downs is that unless you are doing IVF, by the point you are detecting it, it's not something that gene therapy is going to be able to fix until we're getting towards 'Starfleet' tech levels. It's also not something that could realistically be 'eradicated' simply because of the kind of mechanical error that it is. It's really something that I would have to punt on and fall back on the 'her body, her choice' and that everyone's experiences and needs are different.
Now, something curious that I want to bring up is that a lot of people seem opposed to gene modification for 'minor' issues. Eye color, hair color, etc. But what if there was a gene therapy that would guarantee everyone is going to have great teeth? It's something almost everyone of any means is going to want or get fixed anyways, so why not do it in the womb instead of making kids wear braces or whatever kids these days use. From there, what about height? There are real provable differences in income and happiness levels for short vs. tall people, so why wouldn't you fix this if you could and make sure your kid will be 6'3" or so... What about jacking up metabolism / turning down appetite so your kid doesn't have to deal with being fat or having body image disorders? Genetically perfect boobs in girls? After all, a lot of places boob jobs are something every girl of means gets, so why not avoid the potential cost and complications of surgery and do it 'naturally'?
It's pretty much the definition of a slippery slope, but when you look at places like Korea or China, where pretty much every kid of means is getting cosmetic surgery to fix their appearance, it's easy to make a compelling argument to avoid the risk and quality of life issues, and just do it all in the womb. And from there, intelligence (once we've got those gene combinations figured out), resistance to disease (wouldn't it be nice to know you are immune to HIV because of that Russian gene?) etc.
I could see this being something so highly demanded that we have Gattica, but it's not just something for the rich. It's something like prenatal vitamins today that everyone does. I'm not sure that's wrong. Maybe on a large scale, but not on an individual scale, and no raindrop caused the flood...
If the end result though is that around the world we've got healthier, happier, smarter people, isn't it a worthwhile goal? The transition might be a bit sucky, and there are risks, but I don't see this being something that the 'rich and famous' can keep to themselves. Once the science is worked out, it'll end up basic enough and it'll be in high enough demand that in one generation it'll be like someone flips a switch. I still don't know if this is a good thing, but I certainly don't think that suffering for the sake of suffering is good either.
"Hey, man, I'm really sorry you had to put up with all that pesky racism for all your life, but don't worry. We are improving as a society and we have the solution to eliminate racism, all your children will be white by decree".
Although if sex dysphoria could be detected and sex changed during development (highly unlikely, but since we are all assuming things...) I would see nothing wrong with that, better now than later after years of hormonal treatment.
The reason I posted my comment in the other thread was that I did not feel it particularly germane to this thread.
As far as this thread goes, sign me on to whatever @Feral is saying. I'm sure he's right.
Well sure, if you think that being born with the "wrong" skin color is no different from, say, the "wrong" number of limbs. Maybe we can distinguish between Sneetch conditions and ones that are intrinsically unpleasant?
edit:
Wait. Would that mean you consider changing the brain to match the rest of the body, even prior to any significant neural activity, to be unconscionable too? Or is there a minimum age requirement for it to become a bad thing?
I wouldn't even consider this eugenics. It's very odd to see people discussing it as such.
Eugenics is generally considered to be the removal of "undesirable" traits from the gene pool, either through forced sterilization or execution. That's, you know, bad. Genetic medicine should really have some other term (and probably does.)
The reason it's being discussed as Eugenics in this thread is because it's a spinoff of the GLBT thread where the trans individuals in the thread were comparing a hypothetical cure for gender dysphoria to Eugenics.
I know. I made that sme point on my first post in this thread, but people still seemed to consider it eugenics, so I just rolled with it.
@Tenek That's the thing, deciding exacly what's wrong. I know whatever SKFM says can't be considered a serious argument, but he was arguing that if people was getting upset about different skin colors, then why not eliminate all skin colors but one. Same with eyes or whatever other trait people are looking down upon.
Thing is, there may come a day when society thinks that homosexuality is a disease and people should be straightened in utero. So the tricky part is to decide what are legit medical conditions and what is harmless variability.
As for gender dysphoria, I don't understand what's the problem if we could detect it and change sex in time. Having the wrong gender identity (or the wrong body, depending on the angle) seems like a pretty big dieal to me, and trans people seem to be distressed by it.
But even if it's harmless, the decision is still up the mother on whether to abort or not, yes?
"Ms. Brown, we've determined the sex of your child. A girl. No visible defects. Congratulations!"
"My husband and I wanted a son to carry on the family name. Abort this one and we'll try again."
Change the body to adjust to what the brain expects, change the brain to expect the "right" sex. I see no difference, honestly.
@emnmnme Sure, why not. I wouldn't do it and I consider it kind of reprehensible, but it's not my choice to make.
Yes, deciding which conditions are which is difficult. Well, sometimes. That doesn't mean you just throw up your hands and play Halo. One thing to consider might be how much of the unpleasantness is innate and how much is because of people being jerks. So, skin color is probably I'm Not Racist But... about, mm, 100% jerks. But something that is a massive drag on quality of life even if other people go out of their way to help you? Well, I don't want to live in Omelas either.
"Oops, make it the way it was before."
And my point is that the term "smart" is so loaded that you need to watch where you point it. While you may think you're avoiding any loading of cultural norms, in fact, your whole statement is fixated around a rather narrow view of intelligence that dovetails with cultural perceptions.
Well, option A is you don't care what the small number of weird decisions are. Option B would probably be three categories: Things you must change, things you may change, and things you may not change.
If you alter the sperm/egg, you've got eugenics.
If you provide gene therapy to a parent that is then passed on, you've got eugenics.
We can't end discrimination, but I suspect that we could lessen it a lot. I am much more confident in our ability to do this through science than through actually getting people to stop being racist. What is the intrinsic value in having one color of skin over another? I can't imagine that there is one, assuming we are able to literally isolate skin color from any other traits (a big assumption, I know, but necessary for the discussion).
I would go one step further. The efficiency gains are so great if we can resolve issues in utero instead of having people take costly medications for their entire lives that gene therapy may well be the only sensible use of our limited resources as a society. And even something that may seem trivial like height could yield incredible efficiency gains if we made it uniform (everything could be built in one size and fit everyone perfectly, machinery, furniture, etc. would all be the perfect design without any need for variations).
Why? What is the argument?
For some of us diversity has an intrinsic value. Same as having different clothes to choose from has an intrinsic value, same that having different foods to eat that are not Soylent Green has an intrinsic value.
Maybe you don't find they have that value, that's ok. Still, good luck convincing people to change their children's skin color for the stability of the country.
I mean, if racist people have problems with the existence of people with other skin colors, imagine the problems they would have with raising a black kid. Unless you want all blacks to have white children because there is racist white people.
I mean, it's easy to see how this non-solution creates more problems than it solves.
So you're saying that while we should encourage genetic diversity and educate the public, it's not necessary to place legal protections on genes to prevent discrimination, right?
Yes. That's not really relevant to the notion that if you were to give everyone the same skills in a world where only a portion of those people could exercise those skills in a productive and personally fulfilling way, it seems likely that some of the people who found themselves without a legitimate and fulfilling outlet would exercise those skills in destructive or otherwise problematic ways. It doesn't really matter what exactly that bundle of skills contains, or what label you attach to it.
I was talking about abortion. Genetic modification for aesthetic purposes has the problem that is made on another non-consenting person. The problem here, is, do you have the right to do that to a kid if it's not solving a legit medical condition? For me it's like naming your kid "Dick McBalls" times one thousand.
As for the "legal protections of genes" I don't know where are you trying to get to, perhaps if you elaborate on your argument instead of stringing me along with questions the discussion will be more productive.
Betas and Deltas are happy, right? I've often thought that the only problem with Brave New World was the Alpha's had too many chances to be unhappy.
Have we ended discrimination against any of those groups?
And for the people cheering diversity for diversity's sake, would you support affirmative action based on eye color?
What is the intrinsic value of skin color diversity? I'm not talking about the value of having people of different races that live in different cultures/subcultures now. I'm asking what would be lost if all of a sudden all people became blue.
How do we get from "not eliminating all eye colors but one" to "affirmative action based on eye color"?
Since we are playing the game of questions:
What inherent value is there in eating a variety of foods instead of the same nutritious green goo every day?
So is your position that we should abandon a consistently effective process with slow but proven results in favour of an untested (in this arena) process with no successes to date (in this arena)?
Because that seems just a little out to lunch.
And if you can find gene alleles that determine if someone is gay (or change the propensity a bit), you'll have people who try to take them out, but you'll also have people who try to put them in. It seems like you might end up with the case where you're not likely to end up with conformity, unless you started out with conformity. (Or unless you have a government mandating certain changes, or allowing one but not the other, etc.)
Better yet, see if you can find genes for a propensity for racism, desire for conformity, xenophobia, etc., and remove them. Besides, if you're going for practical, go with color changing skin, light if you're low on vitamin-d, or in the shade for a while, that changes to darker if you're good on vitamin-d or have been in the sun for a while. If you're going more artistic, you could try some blues or greens for a change, or add some Luciferase?
Or say for example, what if a couple decides to have kids with Hypertrichosis? That may be controversial, but it's not harmful in itself, there may be arguments that they would be discriminated against, but those sorts of arguments could also apply toward going with anything but straight white male.
Or get a hobby.
Think better:
Efficient would be encode everyone so that their melatonin levels were much more dynamically responsive to their ambient light exposure. If you could turn dark skinned in the course of an hour in the sun, then it'd be incredibly helpful for adapting to different climates. Add a vitamin D moderator so that you would lighten to improve vitamin D exposure, and maybe some triggers linked to the DNA repair machinery so you'd darken rapidly before sunburning. This would help people who are currently stuck with a fixed skin color enormously.
That's efficiency. And to boot we've eliminated racism because it would literally not make sense any more.