DailyDirt: Waiting For Superman... From A Test Tube
from the urls-we-dig-up dept
The concept of creating superhumans using genetic engineering has been around for quite some time in science fiction, but now that it's almost becoming a practical thing to do, there are some scientists calling for a moratorium on experimenting with germline engineering until we can debate the issue and come to some consensus on what should be considered ethical. Treating diseases with drugs/radiation/whatever may let an individual patient live longer, but messing with embryonic DNA could have more lasting effects because whatever genetic edits are made will be passed down to future generations (well, unless genetically modified humans are purposely made sterile...). This kind of medicine is going to be controversial for the foreseeable future, but it's going to be done somewhere as the science and technology behind it gets better.- Chinese researchers at Sun Yat-Sen University have already experimented with germline engineering, editing the DNA of human fertilized eggs to remove a blood disease called beta-thalassemia. Their method reveals that a lot more work needs to be done for germline engineering to become a reliable process for treating genetic diseases. They used abnormal embryos that could not be grown further for this particular study, but it's entirely conceivable that future experiments could be done with viable embryos. [url]
- Some optimists are not too concerned with the issues of creating superhumans. Perhaps superhumans will be benevolent and create a better world, but there's no guarantee that super intelligence correlates with super empathy or super kindness. There are no guarantees in life, period, but perhaps we can slow down the rate of problems we create...? [url]
- A three-parent IVF procedure can prevent certain mitochondrial disorders. Children born using this technique have DNA from their "traditional" parents PLUS mitochondrial DNA from a donor mother, and there are presumably some 3-parent teenagers walking around the world right now. [url]
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: biotech, crispr, designer babies, dna, eugenics, gattaca, genetic engineering, germline engineering, gmo, ivf, mitochondria, superhuman, three-parent ivf
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Thank goodness! Ignorant primitives, cowering in their caves and whispering prayers to their magic friends, can no longer halt the progress of science but only temporarily retard its rate.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]