Designer Babies

[someguy]

Well natural selection is not smart at all. If mankind messes nature up too much natural selection will destroy humanity and start back from scratch and nobody will care. If you want to preserve humanity, at this stage, when we have clearly decided to challenge evolution by inventing solutions to our problems perhaps designer babies could be our solution. Smart is smart "good" or "bad" who cares. smart will help humanity make good decisions, maybe those decisions would be to revert to a style of life where the common person uses much less technology than we do today, maybe to use all of our resources to colonize another planet, it's hard to say. I am certain that humanity would be much better off with an army of wise or super intelligent people governing the world. Designer babies could possibly achieve that. we have already messed up our genetic code the way you're thinking of Lucaspa, basically only certain diseases continue to kill us most other genetic mutations stay in our gene pool regardless of what they are. Certain genetics allow beings to accomplish certain tasks intelligence is both knowing what tasks to accomplish and the ability to figure out how to do it.

 

I actually pretty much agree with you but we have already gone too far. Humans evolved to become smart. And we discovered language. and therefore the ability to share thoughts. Then some of us managed to invent things and discover realities of the universe and share those with other people. and then having technology and the ability to speak there is no reason to evolve further in intelligence as a specie. We are really just marginally smarter as a specie than certain monkeys, and evolution in fact makes that necessary. That means the majority of humans use technology they don't really understand nor do they understand what repercussions there could be or how the things it affects work and whatnot. people are for the most part trained to know a lot about very little and to concentrate only on their own duties with money as their objective. with the world under their control and fuel by their fuel to possess more of this technology things could get out of hand and mankind could destroy itself. Having a skewed number of abnormally intelligent people could really help humanity out and lead our specie in a better direction than the randomness greed takes us. They would be charged with knowing a lot about a lot and making sure our non natural activities don't destroy us, making sure we don't do stupid things like go to war for no reason or just for money. and for that designer babies could be the answer.

[lucaspa]

Well natural selection is not smart at all. If mankind messes nature up too much natural selection will destroy humanity and start back from scratch and nobody will care.

 

You seem to have defined "smart" as "preserving humans". That's not how I said natural selection was "smart". Natural selection is better at designing than people are. That's why people use natural selection when the design problem is too tough for them: they get natural selection to design the entity. Natural selection can keep track of the very large number of (often contradictory) design parameters.

 

By doing designer babies, humans are pretending to know which design parameters are important and assign them absolute value. For instance, you seem to have decided that "intelligence" is absolutely good and will solve the world's ills. That may not be true. After a certain point, IQ may be detrimental. More importantly, you are associating intelligence with social responsibility and a desire to help other people, not just help yourself at the expense of other people. Intelligence doesn't work that way. History is full of very intelligent people who were sociopaths.

 

Smart is smart "good" or "bad" who cares. smart will help humanity make good decisions, maybe those decisions would be to revert to a style of life where the common person uses much less technology than we do today, maybe to use all of our resources to colonize another planet, it's hard to say.

 

Smart is not always good. That's what I'm getting at. You have a false premise that some qualities are ALWAYS "good". Qualities/traits are only "good" in certain environments. In other environments, the same trait is bad.

 

For instance, to get "smart" requires a large brain that uses a lot of food. That large brain stresses birth and can end up killing the mother. Not good. Or the glucose requirements of that large brain would cause the person to overeat sweets and become obese -- causing other problems.

 

I am certain that humanity would be much better off with an army of wise or super intelligent people governing the world.

 

Absolutely not! Intelligence does not = wise. Scientists have never been good political leaders. Look at Senator Frisk. Very intelligent and an MD, but wrong as wrong can be about the mental status of Terry Schiabo. Hitler, Lenin, and Mao were all very intelligent. How did they do at governing?

 

we have already messed up our genetic code the way you're thinking of Lucaspa, basically only certain diseases continue to kill us most other genetic mutations stay in our gene pool regardless of what they are. Certain genetics allow beings to accomplish certain tasks intelligence is both knowing what tasks to accomplish and the ability to figure out how to do it.

 

No, we haven't messed up our genetic code. We are allowing genomes to survive that, in less technically advanced conditions, would die. But in doing that we are preserving good traits, too. For instance, technology allowed Stephen Hawking to live much longer than he would have 200 years ago. He even has kids. Now, in your opinion, did humanity gain or lose by keeping Hawking's alleles in the gene pool?

 

Having a skewed number of abnormally intelligent people could really help humanity out and lead our specie in a better direction than the randomness greed takes us.

 

You are making the premise that "abnormally intelligent people" are also morally "superior" and not greedy. What evidence do you have of that? All the self-made billionaires are abnormally intelligent, but their very wealth argues for greed.

 

They would be charged with knowing a lot about a lot and making sure our non natural activities don't destroy us, making sure we don't do stupid things like go to war for no reason or just for money. and for that designer babies could be the answer.

 

Who does the "charging" and making them responsible? And then who controls the power that you are proposing to give to these people? Haven't you ever heard the saying "power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely"? Being intelligent does not mean social responsibility. Most sociopaths score very high in IQ, many in the genius range. Yet they have none of the social responsibility your scheme requires.

 

So, while designing babies for intelligence, do we know enough to design them to be morally responsible? This is one place I say natural selection is smarter than we are. We have no idea what the alleles are that make up social responsibility. Neither does natural selection, but it doesn't need to. Those without those alleles are less likely to be able to stay in a tribe and find mates.

[lucaspa]

We are really just marginally smarter as a specie than certain monkeys, and evolution in fact makes that necessary.

 

Humans have 2 adaptations that lead to our technology:

1. The ability to make tools to make tools.

2. The ability to verbalize abstract ideas.

 

That means the majority of humans use technology they don't really understand nor do they understand what repercussions there could be or how the things it affects work and whatnot. people are for the most part trained to know a lot about very little and to concentrate only on their own duties with money as their objective.

 

So? That's how a society works! People do their own particular jobs and, together, all those jobs make a society bigger than the sum of the parts. And "money" is just a convenient way counting the necessities of life. What people are trying to obtain are food, clothing, shelter. I don't see anything wrong with that objective, do you?

 

A society needs social interactions. Scientists are really good understanding technology but historically they have been very poor understanding social interactions and how to do politics: the art of getting people to live peacefully with one another and cooperate toward a common goal.

 

All species can always get out of hand! Remember, EVERY species produces more offspring than the environment can support. So every species has the means of destroying itself. I doubt humanity can destroy itself. What it can do is destroy its civilization. In that case, then having designer babies with just a few alleles in a world without technology is going to be detrimental.

 

Change the environment, and you change what is "good".

[waitforufo]

As a parent, I assure you that you will have plenty of opportunity to screw up your kids. Having raised three of my own, I for one am glad I left their genes to chance. Does anyone really believe that in such a process there won’t be a few mistakes made? Are you prepared to take responsibility for such a mistake? For a lifetime? Will you send your kid back if they don’t turn out as ordered? Would you sue?

 

Next time you read the news paper check out vital statistics section on new births. Parents seem to select baby names based on fads. When my daughter was born I think half the girls were named Brittany or Tiffany. Can you image the day when a first grade class is full of nothing but identically designed children?

 

Finally, the random nature of your own children helps you have greater compassion and empathy to others.

[Sisyphus]

lucaspa,

 

Your argument seems to hinge on the "natural selection works better than any possible artificial selection" premise, yes? I don't see evidence for the "any possible" qualification, just for the need to be careful. It is tampering with nature, that's true, but is this tampering really fundamentally different from the exponentially increasing tampering we've been doing for thousands of years? All technology, let alone medicine, is a tampering with natural selection. Or, looking at it another way, it isn't: our technological advancement is just part of the natural process, in which case developing the capacity to consciously alter ourselves would be part of that natural process, as well.

 

Also, you seem to be equivocating with regards to "good" in the natural selection sense (i.e., traits that would be selected for, i.e. traits that would increase chances for offspring in a particular environment) and "good" in the sense of what we actually want. Yes, it's true that something like intelligence is not going to be good in every case in either sense, but be reasonable. Natural selection might make us into mindless slugs, and that might help us pass on our genes, but you can't tell me you would favor that outcome over continued sentience and civilization just because the former is "natural," can you? "Nature" doesn't "value" intelligence except in very specific circumstances, but WE do.

 

As for intelligence, it is just an example - the argument does not hinge on whether making everyone smarter is ultimately "good" or "bad," only whether any intentional change whatsoever could possibly be "good." However, I happen to think that that particular change, a small increase in average intelligence, would be beneficial. I could make endless speculative arguments for it, but ultimately I would only favor such a thing if more serious study was applied to it first, something which would never happen if people spooked by the whole scifi-like idea refuse to even consider it.

 

Finally, I think your example with Stephen Hawking is a bit flawed. Yes, he would never exist in his present form if severe genetic diseases were all eliminated. And some other great genius will never exist if they aren't eliminated.

[Realitycheck]

So, while designing babies for intelligence, do we know enough to design them to be morally responsible? This is one place I say natural selection is smarter than we are. We have no idea what the alleles are that make up social responsibility. Neither does natural selection, but it doesn't need to. Those without those alleles are less likely to be able to stay in a tribe and find mates.

 

I find this issue really interesting. For a while now, I have been blindly backing nurture, nurture, nurture, only to find out that there is more to it than meets the eye regarding genetic influence of behavioral traits and stuff like that. Is it really fathomable that morals could be influenced genetically? Doesn't it really all come down to survival of the fittest, unless we are taught otherwise? Greed and power are such wild cards when it comes to genetics. I guess what I am trying to say is that, genetically, we are basically all the same (regarding the morality of supporting ourselves), with a very limited range of deviation. We are programmed to survive. The Karankawas believed that it was ok to kill each other to survive, though I guess it is possible that it ran in the family. Do you really think that such higher processes such as morality (man-made) would be genetically influenced? When we become so successful at achieving our goals, so perfect, there really is no control offered by the chaos of nature other than peer pressure (We are at the top of the food chain.), so I guess you do make a good point. Everything else we believe in, we are taught, disregarding disorders, and even then, nothing is set in stone.

 

Of course, someone else will do it first and we will eventually allow it in order to compete and make sure that all of Nancy Reagan's offspring are up to par.

[lucaspa]

As a parent, I assure you that you will have plenty of opportunity to screw up your kids. ... Having raised three of my own, I for one am glad I left their genes to chance. Does anyone really believe that in such a process there won’t be a few mistakes made?

 

I remember being told once (when my wife was pregnant): "It's not a question of whether you will screw up your kids, but how." This was psychological "screw up". As you noted, in designer babies we are talking about screwing up their genome. But you are talking about immediate, individual mistakes.

 

I am talking about collective mistakes that screw up the genome of the entire human species. This happens if every parent designs their babies to the same parameters. We don't know enough about the present environment, much less future ones, to know which traits are going to be evolutionarily advantageous. Better to keep a lot of variation in the human population.

[lucaspa]

Is it really fathomable that morals could be influenced genetically?

 

Not morals, but behavior and moral decisions. Morals are something that is outside us and independent of us. However, the decisions we make about our behavior -- whether they conform to morals or go against them -- are influenced by genetics.

 

Doesn't it really all come down to survival of the fittest, unless we are taught otherwise?

 

Depends on what is "fittest". For every example in nature where "fittest" involves cutthroat competition between individuals of a species, there is an example where "fittest" involves cooperation and compassion between individuals of a species.

 

I guess what I am trying to say is that, genetically, we are basically all the same (regarding the morality of supporting ourselves), with a very limited range of deviation. We are programmed to survive.

 

No, genetically we are quite diverse in what we consider as the best strategy to survive. Some of us are more prone to cooperation in order to survive. Others are more prone to complete selfishness.

 

You also need to separate out culture:

The Karankawas believed that it was ok to kill each other to survive, though I guess it is possible that it ran in the family.

That's culture.

 

Of course, someone else will do it first and we will eventually allow it in order to compete

 

The problem is that, in terms of evolution, the best way to "compete" is NOT to do designer babies. Keep your future options open so that, when the environment changes, there is a lot of genetic variation within the population. That way a few of the individuals will be lucky enough to have the traits to at least survive, maybe even thrive, in the new environment.

 

Let me try to give an example. Intelligence is a multi-gene (polygenic) trait. So, among those genes that take part in deciding intelligence is a gene that also takes part in detoxifying chemicals (and most genes also take part in more than 1 trait--pleiotrophy). The allele (call it A) that really helps intelligence is really bad at detoxifying chemical X. The allele (call it B) that is really good at detoxifying chemical X makes people "dumber". So ... in designing babies everyone opts for allele A and no one has a baby with allele B. Now, all these intelligent people, in order to solve world hunger, come up with an agricultural process that produces chemical X. Now there is a lot of chemical X around but it is very toxic and no one has the allele B to detox it, because they were all designed with allele A. So now, everyone dies and H. sapiens designus goes extinct.

 

However, the old H. sapiens would not have gone extinct. Yes, the few really intelligent people would have made the agricultural process that produced chemical X, but there would still be people with allele B. All those with allele A would have died, but the species would not have died. H. sapiens would still be here, even if it has a lower mean intelligence than before.

[lucaspa]

Your argument seems to hinge on the "natural selection works better than any possible artificial selection" premise, yes? I don't see evidence for the "any possible" qualification, just for the need to be careful.

 

We aren't doing "artificial selection". Instead, the thread is about "designing" babies. Picking the alleles that children will have. Artificial selection is picking among several individuals and doing the selecting -- you still have underlying variation due to the combination of alleles in polygenic traits. This is more making a baby from scratch and picking exactly which alleles are used.

 

The idea that natural selection is better at designing than we are is based on the fact that humans turn to natural selection when the design problem is beyond them. Natural selection can design things that we can't or don't know how. Moreover, once natural selection does the design, humans are often not bright enough to figure out how it works! See end of post for some examples.

 

We can't be "careful" because we simply don't have ANY information about future environments or what variations will be needed for those environments.

 

It is tampering with nature, that's true, but is this tampering really fundamentally different from the exponentially increasing tampering we've been doing for thousands of years?

 

Does it have to be "fundamentally different" to still be such a stupid thing we shouldn't do it? I'm not arguing that it isn't part of the "natural process" or an extension of technology, but that it is a stupid thing to do! Please read carefully: my argument was NEVER based on designer babies being "not natural".

 

Also, you seem to be equivocating with regards to "good" in the natural selection sense (i.e., traits that would be selected for, i.e. traits that would increase chances for offspring in a particular environment) and "good" in the sense of what we actually want.

 

I'm not "equivocating". I'm saying there is a difference between those 2. I'm also saying that, in terms of evolution, there is no absolutely good trait that is good in every environment. Yet, when we discuss designing humans, it is in the background that increased intelligence is always a "good" trait.

 

Natural selection might make us into mindless slugs, and that might help us pass on our genes, but you can't tell me you would favor that outcome over continued sentience and civilization just because the former is "natural," can you?

 

Not because it is "natural", but because it is survival of the species! Yes, I might personally miss sentience and civilization, but my wants have nothing to do with the reality of evolution. The species would survive. Again, you seem to have made a strawman out of what I am saying. It seems to be convenient for you to portray my argument as based in anti-technology. It's not. It's just that we should recognize the limits of our intelligence.

 

"Nature" doesn't "value" intelligence except in very specific circumstances, but WE do.

 

And that is stupid! Again, you are saying that our desires should be put ahead of reality. That goes against everything I have learned as a scientist: the universe is what it IS, not what we want it to be. So, that we value intelligence does not mean that it IS valuable all the time.

 

I would only favor such a thing if more serious study was applied to it first, something which would never happen if people spooked by the whole scifi-like idea refuse to even consider it.

 

Nonsense. The study of genetics and traits is going to happen anyway. Lots of people, including me, want to know which genes and which alleles of those genes determine intelligence, immunity, aging, formation of wrinkles, atherosclerosis, bone remodeling, and anthing else you can think of. And we are going to do those studies, no matter the stupidity of doing designer babies.

 

Finally, I think your example with Stephen Hawking is a bit flawed. Yes, he would never exist in his present form if severe genetic diseases were all eliminated. And some other great genius will never exist if they aren't eliminated.

 

You missed the point entirely. Traits are polygenic and genes are pleiotrophic. So, by eliminated an allele that contributes to Lou Gehrig's disease, that same gene may also contribute to inheritance, and it is that allele that helped Hawking be as smart as he is. By eliminating that allele, you have made it impossible for any human to have the combination of alleles that Hawking had and, thus, impossible to get that level of intelligence.

 

"I'm really exploring what evo-lution can do that humans can't," he explains. "There are properties that humans have great trouble designing into a system, like being very efficient, using small amounts of power, or being fault tolerant. Evolution can cope with them all." Evolving A Conscious Machine BY Gary Taubes Discover 19: 72-79, July 1998

 

Archive: 15 November1997]

http://www.newscientist.com/ns/971115/features.html

http://www.newscientist.com/nsplus/insight/ai/primordial.html

CREATURES

FROM PRIMORDIAL SILICON

 

"Let Darwinism loose in an electronics lab and just watch what it creates. A lean, mean machine that nobody understands. ... It is unremarkable that a microprocessor can perform such a task--except in this case. Even though the circuit consists of only a small number of basic components, the researcher, Adrian Thompson, does not know how it works. He can't ask the designer because there wasn't one. Instead, the circuit evolved from a "primordial soup" of silicon components guided by the principles of genetic variation and survival of the fittest."

 

1. MJ Plunkett and JA Ellman, Combinatorial chemistry and new drugs. Scientific American, 276: 68-73, April 1997. Summary of article: "By harnessing the creative power of Darwinian selection inside a test tube, chemists can now discover compounds they would not have known how to make. "

 

3. AI Samuel, Some studies on machine learning using the game of checkers. IBM Journal of Research Development, 3: 211-219, 1964. Reprinted in EA Feigenbaum and J Feldman, Computers and Thought, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1964 pp 71-105. Samuels has a program designed by natural selection that can beat the human checkers champ, but can't figure out how it works.

 

11. Ronald R Breaker, Gerald FA Joyce DNA enzyme with Mg2+-dependent RNA phosphoesterase activity Chemistry & Biology 1995, 2:655-660. No naturally occurring DNA enzyme in nature. Joyce had NO idea how to make one. Used natural selection to do it.

9. FS Santiago, HC Lowe, MM Kavurma, CN Chesterman, A Baker, DG Atkins,LM Khachigian, New DNA enzyme targeting Egr-1 mRNA inhibits vascular smooth muscle proliferation and regrowth after injury. Nature Medicine 5:1264-1269, 1999. Used Darwinian selection to design a DNA enzyme (not found in nature) that degrades mRNA for use in treating hyperplasia after balloon arthroplasty. Humans have no idea what the nucleotide sequence of the DNA enzyme is because they didn't make it --Darwinian selection did.

[ErionaBabes..]

First of all, i'd like to start off by saying HI PEOPLE.

Well, let's look at the first matter. INTELLIGENCE.

PEOPLE, it' running out!! The way that our human race is evolving now is ****ing ridiculous, people are killing each other over basically, jackshit.The schools don't know what to do with their students because they are failing to understand things and grip matters of their class subjects properly. The president of USA, is an idiot. Well anyways, on a more serious note. The more intelligence we have in the world, THE BETTER, i say. BUT, yes there is a but people, not literally a BUTT, but you get it right?- What will happen to thoe children who were conceived naturally and not in a test tube? - they will be left with the bad jobs people!They might not even be given a chance to prove themselves, classed as 'normal' and will probably be frowned upon b the rich and those 'intelligent designer' babies. Whatever, more like robot from hell tube babies.

 

Have you considered the FEELING for the baby? How will they feel when they have to face the truth, their mummy and daddy didn't want THEM, they wanted something other and better than what the children would have turned out if they had been conceived naturally. PEOPLE, do you not CARE about what you children who will later become ADULTS with babies of their own will feel. Like hell you do.

 

LOOK, AM BEATING MY BRAINS OUT HERE TRYING TO MAKE UP MY MIND:doh:, GOOD OR BAD?,GOOD OR BAD?

& MY FRIEND HELPED ME OUT, badBADbadBADbadBADbad!!!

 

but yeah, we still need intelligence.

sorry but if your children aren't illiterate or dyslexic, make them revise until their eyes get sore, It's the only way people. Besides, i reallydon't want any country i the world to be run by an idiot. EXAMPLE: Mr.Bush. AKA unibrow man!!

HIM<--:eyebrow: YAAAAY, bombs, what now? OOPS.BOOM!!!:eek:

 

AHHHH WHATDOIDONOOOOOWW!!!!!!???

ah well, let's just screw another country over. Prepare yourself, NEXT!!

why hello there, RUSSIA, how is your army doing today?

and then he goes to the mattresses. AKA, war!!!

[nitric]

that sounds like a bad movie i saw