Future of human genetic engineering, class divides, and race divides

[Jason Harvestdancer]

I think the first priority, before enhanced genetics, would be eliminating detrimental genetics. Inheritable genetic disorders would be a prime target for elimination, and those who carry them would want to ensure that their children do not.

And for all the fear on the right AND the left about genetic manipulation (as in the move Gattaca) it would be hard to argue against. Wouldn't it be nice to eliminate, for example, cystic fibrosis? Or better yet, eliminate Tay–Sachs disease? Who wants to see their child die by age six when some genetic manipulation pre-conception would eliminate the risk?

Yes, though, this would open the door for creating improved offspring (as in the movie Gattaca). And yes, as in every single technology ever invented the rich would benefit first before the poor. Just like cell phones in the 1980s.

 

[Nice Squirrel]

I am arguing that measuring intelligence is arbitrary (since it is trying to set a single comparative point of a multivariate set of measurements -- think of the various ways we can measure intelligence including social awareness, adaptability, mechanical, situational, recall of facts, complex mathematics, etc.) and there are variations between individuals that are due to many factors genetic and environmental. People that are smart in some measurements are dumb in others, but to just try to make judgements on people based upon what the researcher considers "important" could make a low-functioning autistic human "highly intelligent" as long as they fit the right criteria is highly dubious to me.

Are you saying some people are indeed smarter than others but we are incapable of measuring these differences?

Or that we can measure differences but we should not attribute them necessarily to genetics?

I am arguing environment acting upon phenotypes and its relationship to causality as well as the arbitrary categories we choose as measurements of intelligence. Take Edward Teller for instance. No one will argue that he is not intelligent or simply brilliant, but he advocated for the use of thermonuclear explosive devices as construction tools (Project Chariot) despite the known radioactive wasteland it would create (A very dumb idea but typical thinking of one who works in theoretical engineering. Just because we can do it, doesn't mean we should.)

 

[AthenaAwakened]

What does smart mean?

street smarts or book smarts?

Or people smarts, or puzzle smarts, or animal smarts?

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What does smart mean?

I remember a 60 Minutes segment from many years ago, which interviewed several Autistic Savants(once called Idiot Savants). One of them could calculate the day of the week, given any date in history. He also remembered the weather for everyday of his life, from around age two and up. He was correct for every answer given. Beyond these talents, he could not function in the real world. When Morely Safer asked him how he performed these feats, he replied, "Because I am smart."

I saw that show too. Plus there was a young man who could play any piece of music on the piano after hearing it only once. I envy him that gift.

 

[ksen]

Ok, let's start with this one:

Regardless of current popular beliefs, we are on course for a sharp clash with reality. As much we may believe that intelligence has nothing to do with genetics, the science is plain, and psychologists who specialize in intelligence are nearly unanimous on the point that intelligence variations among humans really are mostly genetic.

Sure. Since that request is for a claim about what academics believe and not for why the claim is true, maybe a quote from SparkNotes would be sufficient.

http://m.sparknotes.com/psychology/psych101/intelligence/section3.rhtml

"Estimates of the heritability of intelligence vary, depending on the methods used. Most researchers believe that heritability of intelligence is between 60 percent and 80 percent."

Your spark notes link says:

Heritability estimates apply only to groups on which the estimates are based. So far, heritability estimates have been based mostly on studies using white, middle-class subjects. Even if heritability of IQ is high, heredity does not necessarily account for differences between groups. Three important factors limit heritability estimates:

1.Heritability estimates don’t reveal anything about the extent to which genes influence a single person’s traits.
2.Heritability depends on how similar the environment is for a group of people.
3.Even with high heritability, a trait can still be influenced by environment.

So I don't see it making the broad claims that you made in the OP that we're talking about.

Why would heritability depend on similar environments? To me that reads like environment is the overriding factor not heritability.

 

[Sarpedon]

The movie Gattacca was stupid. Sorry buddy, but we don't allow people with heart disease to be astronauts now, even with no genetic engineering. The entire movie revolved around him elaborately trying to evade a sensible safety precaution. The whole genetic engineering stuff was an unnecessary subplot.

 

[ksen]

The movie Gattacca was stupid.

Honestly, could have ended your post right there.

 

[arkirk]

street smarts or book smarts?

Pick whichever you want. Do you agree some people have more of it than others?

Harlem Smarts, Harvard Smarts, desert smarts, aboriginal smarts, small farming smarts, animal husbandry smarts, Islamic versions of smarts, molecular biology smarts, nuclear physics smarts, machine set-up smarts. Who should care if you have more or less of some type of smarts? That's what I am getting at. Are you healthy and well adjusted to the society in which you live? Atheists in America use a lot of their intellectual capacity coping with the God thing. There are so many varieties of conditions people have to live in, it is impossible to accurately define intelligence. The best we can approximate is functional adjustment to one's environment and there are problems with using that as a measure of intelligence.

If you measure intellect on the basis of how well you function within a given environment, then change that environment dramatically, oops! where went your brains? Often disinterest in the only type of work a person can find employment in makes people on assembly lines and in other very poor intellectual environments appear "stupid."

You still have your intellect. It is just not very functional in the new environment.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

In my opinion the whole movie was about the genetic engineering stuff and its effect on society creating a dystopia (although not as oppressive as some distopias) wherein genetics determines ones place in society. The avoidance of a sensible safety procedure was a vehicle for the actual topic.

 

[Perspicuo]

I agree.

Euros will have to GM to keep up with Jews and East Asians in intelligence, and with Afros in hotness and athletic ability.



(Now seriously, racism sucks. Let's go all interracial until the racist meme is drowned in a pool of love and sanity.)

 

[dismal]

Are you saying some people are indeed smarter than others but we are incapable of measuring these differences?

Or that we can measure differences but we should not attribute them necessarily to genetics?

I am arguing environment acting upon phenotypes and its relationship to causality as well as the arbitrary categories we choose as measurements of intelligence. Take Edward Teller for instance. No one will argue that he is not intelligent or simply brilliant, but he advocated for the use of thermonuclear explosive devices as construction tools (Project Chariot) despite the known radioactive wasteland it would create (A very dumb idea but typical thinking of one who works in theoretical engineering. Just because we can do it, doesn't mean we should.)

When you say something like "Edward Teller is brilliant" it seems you are acknowledging both that some people are smarter than others and that we have at least some ability to tell who they are.

This still allows us the possibility that people we deem smart say or do stupid things, and/or that some people who are adept at one thing are not as adept at other things.

 

[ksen]

I can't wait until dismal finally gets to his point. It's probably going to be mind-blowingly fantastic.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

So, how do we prepare? Not with current laws. I propose that we (1) legalize genetic engineering of humans, and (2) subsidize genetic engineering for the lower classes.

HELL YES.

The logical result is the end of classism and the end of racial divides. Gene therapy to increase mental capacity, reduce emotional/social disorders, increase memory retention and spatial reasoning centers, etc. I can hear all the familiar alarmism about "designer babies" and such, but there are too many people in the lower (and even middle) class who will seize ANY opportunity to give their children an advantage -- or at least a goddamn fighting chance -- to succeed in a highly competitive world that offers few opportunities and little consolation.

Of course, that's also the reason it will never EVER be allowed to happen. The upper classes love having their advantages and will be quick to outlaw any technology that will threaten their position at the top of the pyramid. Any sort of negative side effects of human genetic engineering (YOU know there will be, it's almost impossible for there not to be) will b seized on as a reason to ban the practice altogether or tightly restrict it to carefully licensed clinics that, coincidentally, only happen to be located in upper-class neighborhoods and only offer services at exorbitant prices.

 

[ksen]

The poors can have all the designer smart babies they want. The real humans will still have their networks and connections to ensure their families' continued status as Lords of the Universe.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

The poors can have all the designer smart babies they want. The real humans will still have their networks and connections to ensure their families' continued status as Lords of the Universe.

While they're at it, poor pregnant women should also avoid having prenatal vitamins and should feel free to drink and smoke as much as they like. The overall odds are against their kids, so why bother to trying to do anything?

 

[Crazy Eddie]

The poors can have all the designer smart babies they want. The real humans will still have their networks and connections to ensure their families' continued status as Lords of the Universe.

True as that is, most of us aren't aiming for "Lord of the Universe" status. Many people living in poverty would happily settle for no longer living in poverty.

Suppressing of genetic disorders as well as the availability of enhancements would at least create an environment where poverty alone is not considered an obstacle to hiring. Between a candidate with a bachelor's degree and a candidate with a high school diploma and gene mods for eidetic memory, the latter would actually be a more attractive candidate in some positions.

 

[Bronzeage]

When Eugenics was all the rage, it was considered a science, and it was based on the accepted science of the day. In our more enlightened era, we recognize eugenics was simply a confirmation of prevailing social prejudices.

About every 15 years or so, someone dusts off the tired old pony of eugenics, dresses it in the latest accepted science of the day, and trots it out for another show.

The premise never changes. There are some very smart people who want to raise the average by eliminating the lowest among us. We must understand, this is for our own good.

 

[ksen]

"How to serve the poors"

IT'S A COOKBOOK!!

 

[AthenaAwakened]

You do realize that the problems of humanity do not stem from our genes but from our values.

No amount of genetic manipulation will make a jerk anything more than a jerk with genetic manipulation.

There are no quick fixes and no way to get around changing the way we behave and what behaviors we will accept in others.

 

[Bronzeage]

The poors can have all the designer smart babies they want. The real humans will still have their networks and connections to ensure their families' continued status as Lords of the Universe.

True as that is, most of us aren't aiming for "Lord of the Universe" status. Many people living in poverty would happily settle for no longer living in poverty.

Suppressing of genetic disorders as well as the availability of enhancements would at least create an environment where poverty alone is not considered an obstacle to hiring. Between a candidate with a bachelor's degree and a candidate with a high school diploma and gene mods for eidetic memory, the latter would actually be a more attractive candidate in some positions.

It helps if one wonders why genetic disorders still exist, after several million years of human breeding. Why haven't bad genes simply vanished from the genome?

The Sickle Cell trait is a genetic disorder which usually leads to an early death. If a person has two Sickle Cell genes, they are likely to die of Sickle Cell Anemia. If they have only one Sickle Cell gene, they are less likely to die of malaria. The Sickle Cell gene makes human blood less hospitable to the malaria parasite.

Cystic Fibrosis is another genetic disorder which leads to a young death. The test for the CF gene has been around for a while now, and parents can test for CF, in the womb. It's the same old story. Two CF genes is a death sentence. One CF gene means a resistance to heart damage caused by Rheumatic Fever.

The Sickle Cell gene evolved in Africa, where blood borne parasites are common. The CF gene evolved in Europe, where Rheumatic Fever was a problem.

Tinkering with the genes of an individual person, with the hope of making their life better is a a noble goal. Tinkering with the genes of the entire species is a very dangerous path.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

When Eugenics was all the rage, it was considered a science, and it was based on the accepted science of the day. In our more enlightened era, we recognize eugenics was simply a confirmation of prevailing social prejudices.

About every 15 years or so, someone dusts off the tired old pony of eugenics, dresses it in the latest accepted science of the day, and trots it out for another show.

The premise never changes. There are some very smart people who want to raise the average by eliminating the lowest among us. We must understand, this is for our own good.

With genetic engineering, though, the possibility exists not to "eliminate the lowest" but to uplift the lowest to a more tenable position. Basically, elimination by transformation.

True as that is, most of us aren't aiming for "Lord of the Universe" status. Many people living in poverty would happily settle for no longer living in poverty.

Suppressing of genetic disorders as well as the availability of enhancements would at least create an environment where poverty alone is not considered an obstacle to hiring. Between a candidate with a bachelor's degree and a candidate with a high school diploma and gene mods for eidetic memory, the latter would actually be a more attractive candidate in some positions.

It helps if one wonders why genetic disorders still exist, after several million years of human breeding. Why haven't bad genes simply vanished from the genome?

Because
1) evolution is a VERY slow process, and "bad genes" don't always reduce reproductive fitness enough to be quickly eliminated
2) some disorders are the result of random mutation, which can be triggered by either environmental causes or by recessive genes that are expressed in a weird way. The potential for those disorders can lay dormant in a genome for generations before it finds expression
3) As you've shown, not everything we consider to be "bad genes" is actually bad in the context of reproductive fitness: stupid people tend to have more children than they can afford to support, and in most human societies the progeny of stupid people are not abandoned to starve to death in the gutters; a predisposition (if any) towards irresponsible behavior would lead to the next generation ALSO breeding irresponsibly, and thus the "irresponsible gene" proliferates way faster than the "Prefers careful family planning" gene.

The trick is to modify only the genes that are producing traits that are no longer helpful in the CURRENT circumstances. Evolution, for example, cannot keep pace with economic changes and isn't going to help your children develop a genetic predisposition to computer science or biomedical research. Even less so if twenty years from now we start colonizing space and suddenly everyone needs to be able to calculate differential equations in their head.

The goal isn't to create a "perfect human" with no genetic flaws. The goal is to give new children a starting advantage that they can use to get what they want later in life.

The Sickle Cell trait is a genetic disorder which usually leads to an early death. If a person has two Sickle Cell genes, they are likely to die of Sickle Cell Anemia. If they have only one Sickle Cell gene, they are less likely to die of malaria. The Sickle Cell gene makes human blood less hospitable to the malaria parasite.

Cystic Fibrosis is another genetic disorder which leads to a young death. The test for the CF gene has been around for a while now, and parents can test for CF, in the womb. It's the same old story. Two CF genes is a death sentence. One CF gene means a resistance to heart damage caused by Rheumatic Fever.

The Sickle Cell gene evolved in Africa, where blood borne parasites are common. The CF gene evolved in Europe, where Rheumatic Fever was a problem.

Tinkering with the genes of an individual person, with the hope of making their life better is a a noble goal. Tinkering with the genes of the entire species is a very dangerous path.

Which is why I wouldn't support MANDATORY genetic screening to eliminate disorders. It should be a medical and developmental issue, not a matter of national priority.