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Scientists grow bigger monkey brains using human genes, replicating evolution

interestingengineering.com

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Re: Scientists grow bigger monkey brains using human genes, replicating evolution

#341

Post by gyvastis »

hyko wrote: post #274

This should never have gotten past ethical review. It’s the sort of shit that gives the word science a bad name. And the payoff was...what, exactly? We already knew that ARHGAP11B would promote a bigger brain size and neocortex folding, so the theoretical benefit is really zero. We’re precisely no closer to understanding the history of human evolution. So what practical use is creating monkeys with more human like br…

It doesn't seem to be related to understanding "the history of human evolution" anymore.

Re: Scientists grow bigger monkey brains using human genes, replicating evolution

#343

Post by chuckdarwin »

fjfaase wrote: post #311

The interesting thing about gene ARHGAP11B is that it is a truncated version of ARHGAP11A, meaning that it was caused by a degenerative mutation, which goes totally against creationist arguments that degenerative mutations can never lead to improvements, let alone the development of new species. This should be mentioned in every textbook about evolution to counter the arguments of creationists.

Evolution vs Creationism is such a false dichotomy! There are MANY scientists who make this claim. That doesn't mean they are creationists. They simply aren't accepting that mutations are sufficient. Which is a perfectly reasonable and scientific claim to make.

Re: Scientists grow bigger monkey brains using human genes, replicating evolution

#344

Post by Draken93 »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #332
MinusGix wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In part this is arguing over a definition of nature. You're going for the obvious "We are part of nature because nature created us and we work within the system." while they're going for the idea of it being more strictly influenced by evolutionary change which we have the ability to 'escape' (escape in the sense that we can go farther than an animal can due to being able to design larger systems without having each…

> Well, as stated before, morality isn't the same between humans. There's no objective authority that decides X is right or Y is wrong, simply social/cultural influences throughout the world. Worth remembering that it's also not the case that every person has different morality, and everyone's moral values are uniformly distributed across the space of possible values. No, the moral values of humans are all very stron…

I would question your point, "that moral values [...] are very strongly correlated [...] across societies". My favourite example is the Aztecs society. Moral values were completly different.

Sparta is another example. The Nazi regime in Germany too. Slavery in the US. I could keep going for another hour.

Moral values are highly dependent on you environmental influences.

Nevertheless you are totaly correct, that the majority of people in a single society shares similair views on moral rules.

Re: Scientists grow bigger monkey brains using human genes, replicating evolution

#345

Post by Thorentis »

grawprog wrote: post #46

I find it hard to describe how I feel about this. These scientists essentially created what may have been a new species, that perhaps would have had similar sentience to us and had them terminated after 100 days. The cat's out of the bag with this research so to speak now. Someone's bound to do this again The part about whether they should have been born or not, which was the ethical thing is what tears at me. Is it…

They were too concerned with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should.

Re: Scientists grow bigger monkey brains using human genes, replicating evolution

#346

Post by bamboozled »

vncecartersknee wrote: post #200

If they tried allowing the fetus to grow indefinitely would they have to figure out how to make the skull bigger or would the skull naturally grow along with the brain? My understanding was that human babies have relatively flexible skulls at a young age?

Had the same question, how can the brain get bigger without having a bigger head?

Re: Scientists grow bigger monkey brains using human genes, replicating evolution

#347

Post by spiritplumber »

Balgair wrote: post #288
spiritplumber wrote: post #268

"My gift to industry is the genetically engineered worker, or Genejack. Specially designed for labor, the Genejack's muscles and nerves are ideal for his task, and the cerebral cortex has been atrophied so that he can desire nothing except to perform his duties. Tyranny, you say? How can you tyrannize someone who cannot feel pain?"

https://alphacentauri.gamepedia.com/Sheng-Ji_Yang God, AC was a great game! My favorite quote was: "I sit in my cubicle, here on the motherworld. When I die, they will put my body in a box and dispose of it in the cold ground. And in all the million ages to come, I will never breathe, or laugh, or twitch again. So won't you run and play with me here among the teeming mass of humanity? The universe has spared us this…

https://paeantosmac.wordpress.com/ You'll love this, then. Bryan Reynolds even showed up to clarify a couple of things in the comments, even!

Re: Scientists grow bigger monkey brains using human genes, replicating evolution

#348

Post by jarek-foksa »

lopmotr wrote: post #262
jarek-foksa wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe what we really need first is a new religion and ethics, one that would eliminate the "playing god" dilemma and enable faster progress in the right direction. It could picture us animals as insignificant and not worthy the attention of the creator of the universe unless we reach ourselves a certain level of intelligence, consciousness and empathy.

We'd have to start by admitting that almost nobody has the faintest clue about ethics beyond simply having been brainwashed into believing whatever arbitrary ethics they believe. Just look at the nonsense and disagreement about abortion. There are so many arbitrary standards people use to advocate for allowing or forbidding abortions at various ages. In my country, they recently adjusted the legal age by a few weeks,…

Yeah, you can see tribalism even here on HN in discussions on different operating systems or programming languages. We are an animal that is irrational, predatory and highly social by nature. Whether we team up to build something useful or to fight with the other tribe depends mostly on the social programming done by the institutions of power such as media, schools and churches.

These institutions also have the power to decide what defines "our" vs "their" tribe. Just the usage of the terms "pro-life" or "pro-choice" already indicates that someone identifies with a specific tribe as the language is an important part of the collective identity.

Re: Scientists grow bigger monkey brains using human genes, replicating evolution

#349

Post by tylerjwilk00 »

grawprog wrote: post #46

I find it hard to describe how I feel about this. These scientists essentially created what may have been a new species, that perhaps would have had similar sentience to us and had them terminated after 100 days. The cat's out of the bag with this research so to speak now. Someone's bound to do this again The part about whether they should have been born or not, which was the ethical thing is what tears at me. Is it…

Replace "new species" with "human fetus" and it's basically the same argument that surrounds abortion.

I am not saying one side or the other is correct, I honestly don't hold a strong opinion on this issue.

Just that we can imagine a certain hypocrisy in a society that is against creating/terminating one life prematurely (smart monkeys)... but yet withholds the same rule against it's own species offspring (humans).

Re: Scientists grow bigger monkey brains using human genes, replicating evolution

#350

Post by yread »

fjfaase wrote: post #340
yread wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get your argument about degenerative mutations. All nonsilent mutations change a perfectly fine working protain so they are all 'degenerative'? Conversely, insertion of random garbage in the middle of a an exon does not delete anything so it's not 'degenerative'?

Some creationist are reasoning that because mutations in genes usually have a negative effect, evolution can not lead to improvements. Here we have an example of a gene that became shorter (probably due to a mutation (deletion, change or insertion) in the middle causeing a stop to be encoded) and lead to a significant improvement, even to the extend that it resulted in a new species. Even if creationist accept that e…

Oh you want to argue science with creationists? We could just point them to oncogenes then - genes that are a bit "broken" normally, so they don't get expressed or don't make a viable protein but a mutation can "fix" them so that they can perform their "normal" function. Unfortunately, that normal function causes cancer.
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