Dna Altering

[Merek]

so i assume every knows about dna changing and such , but i have a question..

the world could benifit if humans had a dna altering to make every 1 of us smarter, more physicaly able , but how do we veiw that...

i even though i know it would benifit greatly, have that feeling in the back of my head telling me how wrong it is to alter what someone really is, and i probably wouldnt like it if it happened to me , but if it became just another way of life in say 20 years , would it be morally ok or just wrong.? :)

[GAHD]

It's like any other type of body modification: it should be left up to personal choice. It's just like tattooing, peircing, and plastic surgury.

 

I soo want a second set of arms, maby a spare heart.

[Merek]

well ya , but it isnt like that becuase you get it before your even a concious breathing human being.

[HydrogenBond]

Altering the DNA could increase our human potential but the external environment would also need to change to keep up with the times. What good is a race car if one can only drive 55.

 

For example, if everyone became a genius, how would culture be able to accommodate all this intelligence. Most of the new ideas would be left on the shelf because there may not be enough resources to accommodate all these good ideas. Or the volume of writing and ideas would go beyind are abilitt to keep up. Too many sports cars would be sitting at the red light idling and overheating. It would probably lead to primative anarchy, or consciouis evolution paradoxically leading to social regression.

[UncleAl]

Authority, responsiblity, liability.

 

Do what you want.

Bear personal responsibility for the results.

Enjoy the profits of success or pay the costs of cleanup.

Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The Welfare State, now theocracy, is an atrocity.

 

Every aspect of religion and government seeks to render people into cripples dependent upon a higher power and forever paying for the privilege. Guaranteed votes or the tap screws shut. Tell Uncle Al why New Orleans died of hunger and thirst for a week while Pakistan got US aid air drops the next day. Who do you think will profit from the building of New New Orleans and its new mission taskings? Who do you think will pay for it? What will happen to 300,000 of the lowest class blacks that formally infested the real estate? The new minimum wage staffings will be tractable, hard-working Mexicans prevented from unionizing until the national crisis abates.

 

Look at your phone bill. There is a 3% excise tax for funding veterans' pensions - of the Spanish-American War, 107 years ago. Check out current Federal legislaton H.B. 1898 and S. 1321. Why is anybody worried about gene-gineering compared to immortal trespasses like that?

[questor]

if you're really upset about government waste ( as you should be ), why not fire all government workers, put them on welfare and hire them back on an as needed basis?

i live near Wash. DC , and i'm firmly convinced any business man could go to DC

on Monday and cut 20% off the expenditures.

[Merek]

hydrogen bond had a lot of good points, but despite what hes saying , thats basically happening now except on a lower level of intelegence.

(i feel) And you (if you got altered Dna) wouldnt have to sit around all day by a desk thinking of new philosiphies and ideas, youd simpley live a life the way we do today , and mabey if you cared would come up with something or not.

[GAHD]

well ya , but it isnt like that becuase you get it before your even a concious breathing human being.

Depends on what kind of engineering you want to do. a properly engineered retrovirus or free floating RNA could be injected into a fully grown human to cause some particular effect.

[HydrogenBond]

Better tools gives one more ways to do better things including enjoying life, family and friends, hobbies, etc.. But unless one earns the money the old fashion way, i.e., inherance, ones many skills, abilities, and choices may have a difficult time being utilized and expressed.

 

The government beaurocracy is there to create jobs and position increases over the life of a career. This often creates an inefficient chief to brave ratio with not enough for either to do, except push paper. Efficiency would would mean not needing as many people to get the job done. However, even in its ineffeciency those jobs imply fathers and mothers who spend money on housing, cars, durable goods, food, etc., all which helps the economy. The alternative is to give the money right to busienss and cut out the little guy middle man. More wealth stays at the top in the hands of fewer rather than be distributed widely to more middle men.

[Merek]

err...k ya lost meh!

[Southtown]

Why is anybody worried about gene-gineering compared to immortal trespasses like that?

Because Uncle Sam inherits the benefits of science at the expense of the layman:

If "E=mc^2" + the goverment = Hiroshima, then "gene-gineering" + the government = ???

[HydrogenBond]

I guess the discusion was changing directions. DNA atering is a future path for science. I am sure it will lead to both good and bad results. The a-bomb led to cold war but it also finally brought peace to the superpowers because of the conscequences. The fear of terrorist today is baby food compared to cold war fear, i.e., hundreds version the real possibility of hundreds of millions.

 

Gene alterring may lead to good and bad. The bad may lead to the same cross roads of thought and circumstance that will bring the need of important social change to be able to accommodate the reality. This might be bad in the short term but good in the big picture of things.

[Southtown]

Let's pray the peace lasts as some consequences are irreparable.

 

The medical field an industry. It only does what is profitable. Ethics or no.

 

http://hypography.com/forums/showthread.php?p=50990#post50990

[Boerseun]

In my opinion, genetic tampering is inevitable.

 

In my hometown in SA, we have the first and only facility in Africa routinely cloning cows and other animals to improve the genepool of African herds and stock in general.

 

Why?

 

'Cause there's gold in them thar cows, that's why. There's bucks involved.

 

If somebody can engineer a retrovirus to destroy any possibility of your offspring having Downs syndrome or any other symptom of faulty genes, they'll put Bill Gates' bank account to shame. Imagine - give all men and women an injection that contains a comprehensive list of genetic alterations, so that the sperm and egg upon meeting contains no funnies, and the next generation will be as clean and healthy as a whistle. Barring cosmic rays and other genetic tamperings, of course. Thalidomide comes to mind.

 

Ethics, like always, bows before capitalism.

[questor]

i would guess that a lot of you whiners would not be around if it were not for the ''unethical'' medical industry. maybe you would have succumbed to polio, smallpox , TB, pneumonia, syphilis or myriad other ailments that kept the life expectancy at around

60 years or less. you are painting the industry with a very broad brush. would you like to return to the dark ages and forego modern medicine? every endeavor has its charlatans and dishonest practitioners, medicine is no worst and is probably much better than most.

[GAHD]

I have only one thing to thank the medical industry for: realising pennacilan is deadly to me before they pumped me too full of it. I stay VERY far away from doctors when possible.

[Boerseun]

Haha - a few years ago, I suffered seriously from insomnia. So my doctor sent me to a psychiatrist! I eventually started bleeding from every possible orifice (yeah - disgusting, I know) and almost died before some bright spark figured out I was busy dying from malaria.

 

Pick up malaria, go see a shrink. How's that for trusting your friendly doctor?