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UK to allow babies from three people

bbc.com

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Re: UK to allow babies from three people

#91

Post by TheSpiceIsLife »

gpvos wrote: post #79
bayesianhorse wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If genetic engineering really became this important to human "performance" or health, I would think that most countries who can afford it, will actually have a way for society to pay for such services. It's the right thing to do, and the most profitable for the society as a whole. Just as in health care the smart policy is to spread the cost and risks around and keep the providers in check so that they can't hold ind…

Then it would increase the difference between rich and poor countries. I'm not sure that that would be any better.

How would it be any different to the world today? The chasm between rich and poor nations is huge. The argument against this is similar in many ways to arguing against, say, smartphones because only the rich can afford them. And yet 'poor' people, even in our own countries, and in 'poor' countries have smartphones, or soon will have access to them.

As soon as a nation of people get organised enough to plan ahead well enough to copy existing technology, or trade it, then technology can be had by all.

I don't believe it makes a whole lot of sense for 'rich' people to preserve a specific set of technologies for themselves when they can get richer if more people are able to pay for it. And where that doesn't happen we see other countries copying the technology.

Re: UK to allow babies from three people

#92

Post by maxerickson »

rpedroso wrote: post #59
adamnemecek wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> invasive genetic modification of humans Besides safety, are there any issues with that?

There is the GATTACA argument that unequal access to genetic modification will foster even greater socioeconomic inequality than we already face today. The film imagined a future in which genetic superiority could be measured by percentile and that job eligibility was based almost exclusively on your genetic score. The implication is that the widespread but costly availability of genetic modification in tandem with f…

GATTACA was a film about a society that only thought they were measuring genetic superiority.

Which is still a great warning to heed, but the hero of the film is the hero because he proves that the genetic screening was wrong about him.

Re: UK to allow babies from three people

#93

Post by TheSpiceIsLife »

Tuna-Fish wrote: post #34
manicdee wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you suggesting there are no limits to growth? No limits to available fresh water supplies? No limits to energy production? Once you run you of fresh water and have to rely on nuclear power to run the desalination plants to keep people watered, you have three major problems.

> Are you suggesting there are no limits to growth? There are limits to growth. We are just not anywhere near them, and don't seem to be approaching them. World birth rates are coming down fast enough that world population will probably never again double. > No limits to available fresh water supplies? Fresh water is a local problem. The world fresh water supply is renewable and renews at a rate several orders of mag…

I thoroughly agree with everything this person just said, with only one exception.

I would contend nuclear is limited only by politics. Removing the political impediments to new nuclear would help a lot. The capital risks are a political problem, not an economical.

Re: UK to allow babies from three people

#94

Post by maxerickson »

toyg wrote: post #81
maratd wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is the GATTACA argument that unequal access to genetic modification will foster even greater socioeconomic inequality than we already face today. Absolutely nothing we can do artificially will have as great of an impact than genetically gifted individuals having children together ... which is already happening and has been happening for eons ... I mean, that's what evolution is. The smart get smarter, the fas…

> The smart get smarter, the fast get faster, the strong get stronger, and the inferior disappear from the gene pool. That stopped some time ago for humans, at least in industralized countries. Modern medicine, long periods of peace and (eventually) welfare provisions have taken care of that. This is a further step in that direction. Evolution works over huge numbers, both in life and death; by effectively reducing t…

This treatment doesn't do anything to reward the mutated mitochondrial genes (your 'step in a direction'), it eliminates them from the population.

If you were saying that the mutated mitochondrial genes were a sign of otherwise inferior genetics, gross.

Re: UK to allow babies from three people

#95

Post by TheSpiceIsLife »

ck425 wrote: post #78
stefantalpalaru wrote: post #5

What are the legal rights of the parent who contributed only her mitochondrial DNA?

I believe the proposals state that the mitochondrial donor has no legal rights in regards to the child.

See my comment elsewhere with regard to the question of what the child's rights might be.

Re: UK to allow babies from three people

#96

Post by V-2 »

The article feels pretty one-sided. Ethical dilemmas are more mentioned than actually explained to the reader, while there was space for two interviews with women in favor of the technique (giving that side of the story a personal tone; no sceptic is interviewed, they're just "some people"), plus these emotionally loaded, cheesy subtitles ("life-saving", "proud")...

Re: UK to allow babies from three people

#97

Post by Fuxy »

gameshot911 wrote: post #16
Cogito wrote: post #9

To those wondering, this does not involve gene splicing or anything like that. Instead, defective mitochondria are being replaced with mitochondria from a healthy donor. This technique is only valid for diseases involving defective mitochondria. The mitochondrial DNA is responsible for very very little of the genetic material that defines who a person is, essentially limited to how effective the mitochondria are at t…

>Those who think this is the start of ever more invasive genetic modification of humans, or so called "designer babies" Well...this is the start of ever more invasive genetic modification of humans.

What's wrong with "designer babies".

I think it would be cool if you could clean up your DNA removing all the nasty genetic diseases you could pass on to your children.

I wouldn't really change the appearance of my child though.

Plus I would keep most of the original genetic material just fix the bits that are detrimental to a long and healthy life.

Re: UK to allow babies from three people

#98

Post by viccuad »

Fuxy wrote: post #97
gameshot911 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Those who think this is the start of ever more invasive genetic modification of humans, or so called "designer babies" Well...this is the start of ever more invasive genetic modification of humans.

What's wrong with "designer babies". I think it would be cool if you could clean up your DNA removing all the nasty genetic diseases you could pass on to your children. I wouldn't really change the appearance of my child though. Plus I would keep most of the original genetic material just fix the bits that are detrimental to a long and healthy life.

You end up with an aristocracy that can afford to have better superhuman children meanwhile the plebs can't afford it. And it would perpetuate itself. Bye tabula rasa in birth and death.

Re: UK to allow babies from three people

#99

Post by rmc »

gameshot911 wrote: post #16
Cogito wrote: post #9

To those wondering, this does not involve gene splicing or anything like that. Instead, defective mitochondria are being replaced with mitochondria from a healthy donor. This technique is only valid for diseases involving defective mitochondria. The mitochondrial DNA is responsible for very very little of the genetic material that defines who a person is, essentially limited to how effective the mitochondria are at t…

>Those who think this is the start of ever more invasive genetic modification of humans, or so called "designer babies" Well...this is the start of ever more invasive genetic modification of humans.

It is for saving lives, not making people prettier.

Re: UK to allow babies from three people

#100

Post by Shivetya »

viccuad wrote: post #98
Fuxy wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's wrong with "designer babies". I think it would be cool if you could clean up your DNA removing all the nasty genetic diseases you could pass on to your children. I wouldn't really change the appearance of my child though. Plus I would keep most of the original genetic material just fix the bits that are detrimental to a long and healthy life.

You end up with an aristocracy that can afford to have better superhuman children meanwhile the plebs can't afford it. And it would perpetuate itself. Bye tabula rasa in birth and death.

We already have an aristocracy that can afford better schools, better neighborhoods, and the like. If designer babies one day leads to no more birth defects or unwanted children it is not a future to be feared.

there will always be people who have an advantage over others, the majority simply comes from where you were born followed to whom to you were born too.

The real fear is likely that some will make choices that are not politically correct, it is certain this would happen in non Western countries.

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