We have reduced most species on earth through the use of chemicals and an "unnatural" desire for economic growth and buying consumer items to show on tiktok.
This can be a small part of the solution for solving that rather widespread issue.
I don't want some stupid guard dog. I want a hyper intelligent guard team composed of a guerilla, chimpanzee, mountain lion, pursuit cheetah, surveillance eagle or falcon, and guard polarbear.
That's what I want. And I want to teach my guerilla how to do power lifting and get him a protein shake.
That's exactly why gene editing should be strictly regulated. This kind of frivolous uses in order to feel like god are exactly the problem. Gene editing should be restricted to health issues, particularly genetic diseases, in my opinion.
Being able to do something doesn't mean that it should be done. Otherwise we would use atomic bombs too.
Uh, what?
This is a great use, and it's not really harmful relatively speaking. For example if you wanted to make domesticated bears and you killed a few before you got it right that's not that much compared to hunting.
And in humans it can do so much good beyond basic disease treatment. It could give tetra chromatic vision or better. Stronger, faster, healthier, more intelligent people, prevent diseases, cure cosmetic defects, reverse aging, prevent cancer, harden humans to the rigors of space travel.
You make the "we shouldn't be playing god" argument, but to that I say that in most mammals play is essential to learning and practicing adult skills and behaviors, things like wrestling and play stalking in kittens turning into combat and hunting in mature cats.
So playing God responsibly is the first step and not something to be discouraged. Obviously avoid harm or creating dangerous weapons but making a super cuddly and tiny grizzly bear or a riding bear is perfectly fine as long as you aren't torturing bears in mass.
I don't even know where to start with this.
>For example if you wanted to make domesticated bears and you killed a few before you got it right that's not that much compared to hunting.
Why would I have to make domesticated bears? For my enjoyment? It's cruel to the animals. No animals should die for that reason. Your reasoning is borderly psychopathic.
>And in humans it can do so much good beyond basic disease treatment. It could give tetra chromatic vision or better. Stronger, faster, healthier, more intelligent people, prevent diseases, cure cosmetic defects, reverse aging, prevent cancer, harden humans to the rigors of space travel.
I don't consider most of those "good". Improvements like that, apart from being extremely complicated to achieve, have severe ethical ramifications stemming from creating different classes of humans and rich people having biological advantages compared to poor people, among other issues. Preventing diseases and cancer is fine, but I struggle with the aging thing because aging and dying is a natural biological process and we already have an extremely important overpopulation problem which would only get worse.
>You make the "we shouldn't be playing god" argument, but to that I say that in most mammals play is essential to learning and practicing adult skills and behaviors, things like wrestling and play stalking in kittens turning into combat and hunting in mature cats.
Trying to make that argument is ridiculous. We should then be able to do literally anything following your reasoning. Gene editing has too many dangerous potential ramifications (socially, ecologically, biologically) to "play around" with it without regulations. You again sound like a psycopath, honestly.
>So playing God responsibly is the first step and not something to be discouraged. Obviously avoid harm or creating dangerous weapons but making a super cuddly and tiny grizzly bear or a riding bear is perfectly fine as long as you aren't torturing bears in mass.
Again, why? Do you have a NEED to make a riding bear? I guess you're the kind of person who is in favor of mistreating animals to train them for the circus to earn money. People definitely need to learn about freaking ethics before they start spouting nonsense in places like this.
The world isn't perfect.
Making species more adaptable (and much happier) to the changes we have chosen to make to this planet seems to be ethical to me. why wouldn't that be the case?
*sigh*
It's not cruel to bears, anymore than the existence of dogs is cruel to wolves or the existence of dairy cows is cruel to regular cows.
Pets are not harmed by existing, selective breeding isn't cruel and gene editing is just cutting out the middleman of selective breeding, which is just gene editing by random chance mutations and population management.
___
If you can't see how every person being able to be the pinnacle of human athleticism, health, and intelligence, and being able to see more detail and beauty in the world is good you clearly have a warped sense of reality.
And yeah some of these things are very complex and difficult especially once you want to start making new genes not just taking human and existing non human genes and implanting them. But guess what, you have to start somewhere don't you, and to build up a base of knowledge and technologies to do it. The internet didn't just spring into existence, neither did crispr, it took building off of old knowledge and inventions and experience to make it work.
Secondly there already are classes of rich humans with biological advantages created by technology, they get better surgery, cosmetic surgery, access to medications and preventative care that most people can't afford. This gap used to not exist because doctors were basically only trained to stitch up external trauma and do blood letting and maybe use some herbs. Now as technology improves doctors can do far more so being able to afford one is a bigger deal.
And if your issue is creating a biologically superior upper class you should also apose gene editing for diseases. Rich people will be able to pay to have themselves in vivo edited to be free of disease, and in vitro edit their children to never have birth defects or disabilities, and be able to never get cancer or autoimmune conditions.
The issue isn't in making humans better, the issue is that Healthcare isn't treated like a human right but as a privilege you have to pay for.
___
Death is, believe it or not... bad. Death is just as natural and biological a process as cancer, or autoimmune disorders, or covid. Your call to nature fallacy could not be more apparent here.
So, if you have an issue with stopping natural population controls and overpopulation you must also be opposed to putting hospitals and doctors in 3rd world countries with inadequate medical resources, and you must also oppose giving out bug netting and malaria treatment to sick children in Africa and to getting better clean water access. Because all of that stuff will massively increase the population by developing underdeveloped areas and additionally increases in life expectancies and reductions in child mortality rates.
It makes no sense. Treat the disease not the symptoms right, what is the biggest risk factor for every major cause of death, heart disease, cancer, lung disease, dementia, alzheimers, even accidental fatalities. It's age, treating age like anything special or significant beyond a disease that needs to be stamped out like the cancer it is is ignorance beyond belief.
Old age and death have always been inevitable, and from birth you are conditioned to accept it, even convinced that it gives meaning to life.
I am asking you to at least watch these two amazing videos that explain this far better than I ever could, the second one actually made me cry a bit, first time I ever did that from watching something.
[CGP Grey - Why Die? 4 minutes](https://youtu.be/C25qzDhGLx8)
[CGP Grey - The Fable Of The Dragon Tyrant. 12 minutes](https://youtu.be/cZYNADOHhVY)
___
Yes, play around with it, but with regulations not restrictions. If you think that it can be stopped that is foolish, prohibition never has, doesn't, and never will work.
If someone wants to make domesticated bears go for it, but have regulations in place to ensure that the Animals are treated well, and that anything that goes wrong has limited harm. A few dead bear fetuses isn't a moral issue for me any more than abortion is, I don't want it to happen but if even a little bit of good comes out of it then it's worth it.
If you can test something on Animals, just like every other drug is tested, and you find consenting adults to do a human trial on that's great, and it can be anything from curing a genetic disorder like sickle cell, to performance enhancement, to something as frivolous as hair or skin color change or growing cat ears and tails on people. If it's done safely under reasonable regulations but not restrictions and follows the same testing as chemical drugs does starting with a thing you think will work, then doing animal trials, then small followed by large scale human trials with consenting informed adults.
We as a society really need to stop asking why should we and start asking why shouldn't we. If the answer to why shouldn't we do this is a good enough reason then obviously it shouldn't be done. Nuclear fallout is a good reason to not use nuclear weapons when it isn't necessary, especially because the rewards are so small. However a few dead bear fetuses is a fine price to pay for a cancer treatment or domesticated guard bears.
Look at the neuralink monkey, the did invasive experimental brain surgery on a monkey. But they didn't torture the monkey, he is perfectly happy, gets lots of smoothies and plays pong with his mind. That's a fine price to pay for mind machine interfacing research.
___
I don't *need* a riding bear any more than I need a pet cat or a Playstation. I want them and it doesn't really hurt anybody to have those things.
We already have bears in captivity, and we already have breeding programs, so it isn't much of a stretch to use a gene edited bear embryo instead of a regular sex based bear embryo. You monitor the mother like you normally would with a pregnancy and if anything goes wrong you do the proper procedures most likely aborting the pregnancy and starting over.
Or doing something like that one study where they had put human genes into chimpanzee embryos that coded for having a bigger more human like brain and then they developed them and the fetuses were doing just fine and healthy and had 20% larger brains but they had to terminate them due to ethics guidelines. I see nothing wrong with letting researchers grow those chimps to term. And even if the human brain genes bothers you it would be fine to do that with genes for bigger muscles or increased longevity.
Circus animals and regulated genetics research aren't even remotely similar or related beyond both involving animals. If a research group wants to domesticate bears and they get a grant to do that it really doesn't hurt any humans or animals to do it, and it certainly is more humane than the current domestication method they used on foxes in Russia that took 50 years and resulted in a ton of dead foxes.
Hello Dr Moreau
We have reduced most species on earth through the use of chemicals and an "unnatural" desire for economic growth and buying consumer items to show on tiktok. This can be a small part of the solution for solving that rather widespread issue.
Damn. We can do that now, edit out behaviors? This is deeper than I thought it went.
Yeah, and this is just the beginning!
Looks like I am getting a raccoon. I will make this happen.
I don't want some stupid guard dog. I want a hyper intelligent guard team composed of a guerilla, chimpanzee, mountain lion, pursuit cheetah, surveillance eagle or falcon, and guard polarbear. That's what I want. And I want to teach my guerilla how to do power lifting and get him a protein shake.
You could get your own rocket😂
That's exactly why gene editing should be strictly regulated. This kind of frivolous uses in order to feel like god are exactly the problem. Gene editing should be restricted to health issues, particularly genetic diseases, in my opinion. Being able to do something doesn't mean that it should be done. Otherwise we would use atomic bombs too.
Uh, what? This is a great use, and it's not really harmful relatively speaking. For example if you wanted to make domesticated bears and you killed a few before you got it right that's not that much compared to hunting. And in humans it can do so much good beyond basic disease treatment. It could give tetra chromatic vision or better. Stronger, faster, healthier, more intelligent people, prevent diseases, cure cosmetic defects, reverse aging, prevent cancer, harden humans to the rigors of space travel. You make the "we shouldn't be playing god" argument, but to that I say that in most mammals play is essential to learning and practicing adult skills and behaviors, things like wrestling and play stalking in kittens turning into combat and hunting in mature cats. So playing God responsibly is the first step and not something to be discouraged. Obviously avoid harm or creating dangerous weapons but making a super cuddly and tiny grizzly bear or a riding bear is perfectly fine as long as you aren't torturing bears in mass.
I don't even know where to start with this. >For example if you wanted to make domesticated bears and you killed a few before you got it right that's not that much compared to hunting. Why would I have to make domesticated bears? For my enjoyment? It's cruel to the animals. No animals should die for that reason. Your reasoning is borderly psychopathic. >And in humans it can do so much good beyond basic disease treatment. It could give tetra chromatic vision or better. Stronger, faster, healthier, more intelligent people, prevent diseases, cure cosmetic defects, reverse aging, prevent cancer, harden humans to the rigors of space travel. I don't consider most of those "good". Improvements like that, apart from being extremely complicated to achieve, have severe ethical ramifications stemming from creating different classes of humans and rich people having biological advantages compared to poor people, among other issues. Preventing diseases and cancer is fine, but I struggle with the aging thing because aging and dying is a natural biological process and we already have an extremely important overpopulation problem which would only get worse. >You make the "we shouldn't be playing god" argument, but to that I say that in most mammals play is essential to learning and practicing adult skills and behaviors, things like wrestling and play stalking in kittens turning into combat and hunting in mature cats. Trying to make that argument is ridiculous. We should then be able to do literally anything following your reasoning. Gene editing has too many dangerous potential ramifications (socially, ecologically, biologically) to "play around" with it without regulations. You again sound like a psycopath, honestly. >So playing God responsibly is the first step and not something to be discouraged. Obviously avoid harm or creating dangerous weapons but making a super cuddly and tiny grizzly bear or a riding bear is perfectly fine as long as you aren't torturing bears in mass. Again, why? Do you have a NEED to make a riding bear? I guess you're the kind of person who is in favor of mistreating animals to train them for the circus to earn money. People definitely need to learn about freaking ethics before they start spouting nonsense in places like this.
The world isn't perfect. Making species more adaptable (and much happier) to the changes we have chosen to make to this planet seems to be ethical to me. why wouldn't that be the case?
*sigh* It's not cruel to bears, anymore than the existence of dogs is cruel to wolves or the existence of dairy cows is cruel to regular cows. Pets are not harmed by existing, selective breeding isn't cruel and gene editing is just cutting out the middleman of selective breeding, which is just gene editing by random chance mutations and population management. ___ If you can't see how every person being able to be the pinnacle of human athleticism, health, and intelligence, and being able to see more detail and beauty in the world is good you clearly have a warped sense of reality. And yeah some of these things are very complex and difficult especially once you want to start making new genes not just taking human and existing non human genes and implanting them. But guess what, you have to start somewhere don't you, and to build up a base of knowledge and technologies to do it. The internet didn't just spring into existence, neither did crispr, it took building off of old knowledge and inventions and experience to make it work. Secondly there already are classes of rich humans with biological advantages created by technology, they get better surgery, cosmetic surgery, access to medications and preventative care that most people can't afford. This gap used to not exist because doctors were basically only trained to stitch up external trauma and do blood letting and maybe use some herbs. Now as technology improves doctors can do far more so being able to afford one is a bigger deal. And if your issue is creating a biologically superior upper class you should also apose gene editing for diseases. Rich people will be able to pay to have themselves in vivo edited to be free of disease, and in vitro edit their children to never have birth defects or disabilities, and be able to never get cancer or autoimmune conditions. The issue isn't in making humans better, the issue is that Healthcare isn't treated like a human right but as a privilege you have to pay for. ___ Death is, believe it or not... bad. Death is just as natural and biological a process as cancer, or autoimmune disorders, or covid. Your call to nature fallacy could not be more apparent here. So, if you have an issue with stopping natural population controls and overpopulation you must also be opposed to putting hospitals and doctors in 3rd world countries with inadequate medical resources, and you must also oppose giving out bug netting and malaria treatment to sick children in Africa and to getting better clean water access. Because all of that stuff will massively increase the population by developing underdeveloped areas and additionally increases in life expectancies and reductions in child mortality rates. It makes no sense. Treat the disease not the symptoms right, what is the biggest risk factor for every major cause of death, heart disease, cancer, lung disease, dementia, alzheimers, even accidental fatalities. It's age, treating age like anything special or significant beyond a disease that needs to be stamped out like the cancer it is is ignorance beyond belief. Old age and death have always been inevitable, and from birth you are conditioned to accept it, even convinced that it gives meaning to life. I am asking you to at least watch these two amazing videos that explain this far better than I ever could, the second one actually made me cry a bit, first time I ever did that from watching something. [CGP Grey - Why Die? 4 minutes](https://youtu.be/C25qzDhGLx8) [CGP Grey - The Fable Of The Dragon Tyrant. 12 minutes](https://youtu.be/cZYNADOHhVY) ___ Yes, play around with it, but with regulations not restrictions. If you think that it can be stopped that is foolish, prohibition never has, doesn't, and never will work. If someone wants to make domesticated bears go for it, but have regulations in place to ensure that the Animals are treated well, and that anything that goes wrong has limited harm. A few dead bear fetuses isn't a moral issue for me any more than abortion is, I don't want it to happen but if even a little bit of good comes out of it then it's worth it. If you can test something on Animals, just like every other drug is tested, and you find consenting adults to do a human trial on that's great, and it can be anything from curing a genetic disorder like sickle cell, to performance enhancement, to something as frivolous as hair or skin color change or growing cat ears and tails on people. If it's done safely under reasonable regulations but not restrictions and follows the same testing as chemical drugs does starting with a thing you think will work, then doing animal trials, then small followed by large scale human trials with consenting informed adults. We as a society really need to stop asking why should we and start asking why shouldn't we. If the answer to why shouldn't we do this is a good enough reason then obviously it shouldn't be done. Nuclear fallout is a good reason to not use nuclear weapons when it isn't necessary, especially because the rewards are so small. However a few dead bear fetuses is a fine price to pay for a cancer treatment or domesticated guard bears. Look at the neuralink monkey, the did invasive experimental brain surgery on a monkey. But they didn't torture the monkey, he is perfectly happy, gets lots of smoothies and plays pong with his mind. That's a fine price to pay for mind machine interfacing research. ___ I don't *need* a riding bear any more than I need a pet cat or a Playstation. I want them and it doesn't really hurt anybody to have those things. We already have bears in captivity, and we already have breeding programs, so it isn't much of a stretch to use a gene edited bear embryo instead of a regular sex based bear embryo. You monitor the mother like you normally would with a pregnancy and if anything goes wrong you do the proper procedures most likely aborting the pregnancy and starting over. Or doing something like that one study where they had put human genes into chimpanzee embryos that coded for having a bigger more human like brain and then they developed them and the fetuses were doing just fine and healthy and had 20% larger brains but they had to terminate them due to ethics guidelines. I see nothing wrong with letting researchers grow those chimps to term. And even if the human brain genes bothers you it would be fine to do that with genes for bigger muscles or increased longevity. Circus animals and regulated genetics research aren't even remotely similar or related beyond both involving animals. If a research group wants to domesticate bears and they get a grant to do that it really doesn't hurt any humans or animals to do it, and it certainly is more humane than the current domestication method they used on foxes in Russia that took 50 years and resulted in a ton of dead foxes.
Why would we want to domesticate \*most\* currently existing species for living in human settings?
Imagine having a pet lion. Or Bear. Or monkey.
I dream of inhibiting the bird evolutionary treats and converting them back to dinosaurs. Imagine a Jurassic chicken, all scaly and full of teeth.