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Gene therapy restores hearing to children with inherited deafness

cosmosmagazine.com

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Re: Gene therapy restores hearing to children with inherited deafness

#111

Post by TyrianPurple »

dyauspitr wrote: post #12
gota wrote: post #2

This stuff seems miraculous. > "Through minimally invasive surgery, Shu injected adeno-associated virus (AAV) engineered to carry and deliver functioning copies of the human OTOF transgene, into the children’s inner ears. " Can't read that and not get curious, excited, for the future. Congratulations to all those involved in the research and thanks to all who contributed to it - including all taxpayers if public fund…

I can’t wait for a geneCAD where we for example, design wings for a human body and then it works out the rest and generates a CRISPR based AAV that you can inject yourself with. True race and sex changes too. Hopefully in the next 50 years but that’s wishful thinking.

Excuse me, are you The Qu?

Re: Gene therapy restores hearing to children with inherited deafness

#112

Post by simianparrot »

LoganDark wrote: post #92
telesilla wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Make sure to read Daniel Dennett before you change too much, you might forget who you are and become someone else entirely. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_It_Like_to_Be_a_Bat

I have Dissociative Identity Disorder, so I already become someone else all the time... In all seriousness, at times I do genuinely wish species transition were possible. Imagine gender dysphoria but for species, so species dysphoria. It may sound insane, but honestly so can the entire concept of dissociative identities. I don't know if I'd want to change my brain, but the physical properties of the body definitely.…

It is the very definition of insane. That doesn't mean we shouldn't have sympathy for it, but it's important to recognise when certain aspects of our psyche isn't sane or good and accept that.

Re: Gene therapy restores hearing to children with inherited deafness

#113

Post by RamblingCTO »

alexey-salmin wrote: post #82
Veraticus wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Objectively,” left-handed versus right-handed changes nothing about a person’s capabilities in the world, whereas being deaf does. Cultural norms is an interesting comparison. Despite there being no actual difference in capacity, cultural views forced many left-handed people to be right-handed, making those people miserable in the process for no good reason.

Being deaf is surely different from not being deaf but you can't objectively say it's a disadvantage. It's only a disadvantage in a world built for not deaf people, like being left-handed is a disadvantage in a world built for right-handed people.

How do you hear predators approaching? It's an objective disadvantage.

Re: Gene therapy restores hearing to children with inherited deafness

#114

Post by geraldwhen »

Veraticus wrote: post #75
alexey-salmin wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people are inherently deaf, what's the difference?

Being LGBTQ is not a disability or handicap; it’s simply different, like being red-haired or left-handed.

If you feel compelled to remove parts of your body and take opposite sex hormones for life, that’s clearly a disability.

If genes could fix your brain to not feel compelled to swap sexes, that would be a huge win in the quality of life for most individuals.

You can pretend that pretty much anything “isn’t a disability, it’s just different.” But that isn’t true.

Re: Gene therapy restores hearing to children with inherited deafness

#115

Post by geraldwhen »

alexey-salmin wrote: post #102
sweezyjeezy wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If all humans could echo-locate except a subset who couldn't, I would say that group is at a small disadvantage, yes, because the set of things the main group can do is 'objectively' greater. I don't know how relevant it would be for us especially in the daytime, but hey.

I agree. However, whether all kids should receive gene therapy to develop the echo-location once the science allows for that is a more nuanced question.

If most buildings lacked light because the vast majority just echolocated, then the those unable would be disabled.

It is okay for there to be a normal human experience, and define inability to participate as a disability.

Re: Gene therapy restores hearing to children with inherited deafness

#116

Post by refurb »

dyauspitr wrote: post #42
akoboldfrying wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's try to fix the world's vast number of actual, boring health problems before trying to add the equivalent of spoilers and chrome-plated hubcaps to perfectly healthy human bodies.

You can do both things at the same time.

Actually you can't because there is a limit to resources in both time and money.

Re: Gene therapy restores hearing to children with inherited deafness

#117

Post by refurb »

jdietrich wrote: post #108
akoboldfrying wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's true if we assume unlimited resources and equal awareness/perceived social value of the two applications. But I think the former doesn't hold, and the latter is greatly influenced by sites like HN, where I'm disappointed to consistently (if not exclusively) see breathless proposals for ways to design shinier hubcaps whenever some promising new technology appears. Yes, they can and likely will both happen to so…

Economies of scale. Shiny hubcap manufacturers will very generously subsidise the R&D for other, more worthy users of a technology. They aren't competitive or independent, they're synergistic. The billions of dollars we "wasted" on making video games look more realistic gave us a revolution in high-performance computing that nobody could have created intentionally.

Each gene therapy is a unique "medicine". There is little economy of scale, at least for the hardest part.

Re: Gene therapy restores hearing to children with inherited deafness

#118

Post by gurumeditations »

akoboldfrying wrote: post #39
dyauspitr wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can’t wait for a geneCAD where we for example, design wings for a human body and then it works out the rest and generates a CRISPR based AAV that you can inject yourself with. True race and sex changes too. Hopefully in the next 50 years but that’s wishful thinking.

Let's try to fix the world's vast number of actual, boring health problems before trying to add the equivalent of spoilers and chrome-plated hubcaps to perfectly healthy human bodies.

Sex changes/gender transitions is an actual boring health problem. The inability to assume the correct gender for a trans person often leads to social rejection, violence, poverty, prostitution, murder, and suicide.

Re: Gene therapy restores hearing to children with inherited deafness

#119

Post by jmcgough »

akoboldfrying wrote: post #39
dyauspitr wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can’t wait for a geneCAD where we for example, design wings for a human body and then it works out the rest and generates a CRISPR based AAV that you can inject yourself with. True race and sex changes too. Hopefully in the next 50 years but that’s wishful thinking.

Let's try to fix the world's vast number of actual, boring health problems before trying to add the equivalent of spoilers and chrome-plated hubcaps to perfectly healthy human bodies.

Most of those problems in the US are caused by lifestyle, and can't really be changed without behavioral modification. And a lot of our health issues are a matter of poor access to healthcare.

Re: Gene therapy restores hearing to children with inherited deafness

#120

Post by deepGem »

"The children involved in the study were born with DFNB9, which accounts for between 2 and 8% of hereditary deafness. It is caused by mutations in the OTOF gene which prevent the production of functioning otoferlin protein, which can significantly reduce sound transmission from the inner ear hair cells to hearing nerves."

Just shows how much of our body functions we take for granted. Every function has a critical path that is so vulnerable. This is despite the human body having all kinds of redundancies. Our body is so resilient, yet at times, some of the mechanisms are so fragile.

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