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Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial

independent.co.uk

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Re: Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial

#81

Post by dotnet00 »

radlad wrote: post #78
dotnet00 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which implants and prosthetics currently exist that are such that a median person would want them and as a result would become super-human?

As was mentioned in another comment, breast augmentation and other forms of body modification in the context of influencers, broadcasters, actors, models, etc. Prosthetics may not quite be there yet, but do you seriously think they won't get there? Military is actively investing in exoskeleton R&D. Whether it's currently accessible to the median person is sort of besides the point.

Re-read my comment, I haven't said anything about the future. My point was just that it seems weird to talk about it as if it has already happened.

It might happen in the future, but it's worth considering that a powerful prosthetic limb or exoskeleton that is superior to the biological version in every way makes both the disabled person and the perfectly healthy person equally superhuman.

Re: Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial

#82

Post by radlad »

dotnet00 wrote: post #79
cush wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

steroids

Most, even in the presented example of the olympics aren't having to compete against those on steroids though?

It's hard to know how many people are getting away with cheating. I'm more familiar with it in the context of cycling, where performance-enhancing drugs have long been a thorny issue.

> In 2004, 4.6% of the anti-doping samples tested were positive, and that is taking into account that there were many dopers who never tested positive.

https://lanternerouge.com/2023/03/26/how-clean-is-cycling-an...

Re: Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial

#83

Post by TeMPOraL »

lioeters wrote: post #27
foobarian wrote: post #4

[flagged]

I used to live in Texas near the biggest deaf school in the U.S. From my understanding, some people in the deaf community do consider the word "cured" to be offensive because they don't consider their condition to be a disease. I don't know if that's the dominant view and preference, but if that's the case, perhaps we should all learn to respect their culture, as much as we're all learning to respect (up to some poin…

Respect has degrees too. The issue gets thorny when, every now and then, a story pops up about some members of that community who want to deny their children interventions that would allow them to hear, or worse, want to intervene to take away their hearing, so they can fit in the same community as parents.

Re: Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial

#84

Post by radlad »

dotnet00 wrote: post #81
radlad wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As was mentioned in another comment, breast augmentation and other forms of body modification in the context of influencers, broadcasters, actors, models, etc. Prosthetics may not quite be there yet, but do you seriously think they won't get there? Military is actively investing in exoskeleton R&D. Whether it's currently accessible to the median person is sort of besides the point.

Re-read my comment, I haven't said anything about the future. My point was just that it seems weird to talk about it as if it has already happened. It might happen in the future, but it's worth considering that a powerful prosthetic limb or exoskeleton that is superior to the biological version in every way makes both the disabled person and the perfectly healthy person equally superhuman.

I re-read your comment, but I still disagree that the evidence provided by myself and others in response, as well as evident near-term future advancements, are irrelevant to the comment you responded to.

> a powerful prosthetic limb or exoskeleton that is superior to the biological version in every way makes both the disabled person and the perfectly healthy person equally superhuman.

I think I'm not following, or else failing to see the relevance to this comment. This is essentially what the GP was getting at: these advancements can/will lead to anatomically "correct" humans failing to compete.

Re: Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial

#85

Post by yodiggity »

thehappypm wrote: post #9

I’m optimistic that at some point, I’ll be able to get a treatment to take care of my red green color blindness. I’m well aware that it’s very much a first world problem, and rightfully should be very low on the totem pole of medical issues to cure. But goddamnit, I want to see red.

[flagged]

Re: Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial

#86

Post by 1970-01-01 »

gherkinnn wrote: post #25

What always interests me with stories of people hearing or seeing for the first time in their life, what is it like to gain a new sense? One would think that growing up with a sense is integral to its processing (and filtering) and the sudden introduction of a sense later in life would come with all sorts of side effects.

NYT has an excellent summary on it. Life becomes very hard when they try to use their new sense in any meaningful way:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/29/books/review/comnig-to-ou...

Re: Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial

#87

Post by highwayman47 »

alsetmusic wrote: post #71

Medical science is about the only thing in modern life that consistently delivers hope. While all the other terrible things are going on, something like this comes along and I’m just extremely happy to be alive right now.

It would be nice if people at these companies were rewarded the same way as food delivery app employees.

Re: Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial

#88

Post by ForrestN »

As a disabled person, I admit to being made slightly uncomfortable by the uncritical framing of genetically modified people as "therapy" that all people should want. Where is the line between "gene therapy" to eliminate differences (such as deafness) and eugenics? If we have statistics that taller people have better outcomes in life, should we do gene therapy to make sure everyone is taller than 6'? How much diversity of human experience is too much?

Obviously, there are easy cases: this kind of technique to prevent conditions leading to abject suffering, for example. But, knowing and admiring deaf people makes me unsure about the idea of "curing" deafness, for example, as a goal of medicine.

Re: Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial

#89

Post by jfengel »

tejtm wrote: post #62
thehappypm wrote: post #9

I’m optimistic that at some point, I’ll be able to get a treatment to take care of my red green color blindness. I’m well aware that it’s very much a first world problem, and rightfully should be very low on the totem pole of medical issues to cure. But goddamnit, I want to see red.

And I want to see UV like our proto progenitors, enough of these little brown birds we can't tell apart.

The problem there isn't your receptors, which are UV sensitive. The problem is your lens, which filters it out. Remove the lens and you can see UV just fine.

Until you get eyeball cancer, that is. UV is mutagenic. That's why you filter it out.

People with cataracts get replacement lenses, and some exist that don't filter the UV. I think they're hard to get, what with the whole "eyeball cancer" thing. But if I get to my 70s and need replacement lenses (I do have a family history), I'm going to campaign to see if I can spend a couple of decades looking at the pretty birdies.

Re: Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial

#90

Post by virissimo »

ForrestN wrote: post #88

As a disabled person, I admit to being made slightly uncomfortable by the uncritical framing of genetically modified people as "therapy" that all people should want. Where is the line between "gene therapy" to eliminate differences (such as deafness) and eugenics? If we have statistics that taller people have better outcomes in life, should we do gene therapy to make sure everyone is taller than 6'? How much diversit…

Perhaps we should have different words for voluntary (choosing to regain your hearing, etc...) and coercive (forced sterilization, etc...) "eugenics", since almost all of the negative connotations of the word are (rightly, IMO) attributed only to the latter.
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