
Genetic Architecture of Gray Matter - conse_lad
http://news.unchealthcare.org/news/2020/march/worldwide-study-unlocks-genetic-secrets-of-gray-matter
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nine_k
An illustrative link: [https://infoproc.blogspot.com/2017/03/everything-is-
heritabl...](https://infoproc.blogspot.com/2017/03/everything-is-
heritable.html) (A short post with a nice chart, contains a further link to a
proper paper.)

Regarding the pessimism of genetic pre-determination and this congenital
disadvantage: I think the real progress of society is how it learns to make
lives of _different_ people productive and satisfying. E.g. nerdy types had it
hard in, say, 19th century Europe, but now they have a great and important
niche in engineering. Same happened to many more predispositions of people
that now lead to something interesting instead of pure misery.

I think this process is not going to stop.

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twomoretime
So how will society adapt when specific genetic variants inevitably are tied
to predisposition for intelligence and behavior?

ADHD, autism, BPD, as listed in the article, are not specific conditions, but
rather represent a range of behavioral and intellectual tendencies that are
better described as clusters in high dimensional personality space. If there
are already 300 genes mapped which influence this handful of conditions, that
implies that we already know of specific genes which effectively influence
behavior by shifting psychology around these clusters.

And since genes are heritable, this has consequences for groups of people and
their interactions in greater society. This may be an unpleasant question but
if research proceeds in this field it is one that will have to be answered.

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red75prime
I don't think it will influence course of events much. Governments will
reluctantly allow genetic treatment of debilitating heritable conditions
(nothing else, for obvious political reasons). And then brain-computer
interfaces will make heritable component of intelligence less important.

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nine_k
Brain-computer interfaces won't do much to the structure of motivation and
other traits that make certain genetically "more nerdy" types better
predisposed to certain types of mental work. Much like easy and cheap
computer-based DAWs and musical instruments did not make everyone a musician
or a composer on equal footing.

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aiscapehumanity
You can literally stimulate networks, you may even be able to chemically and
topologically change networks with combined technologies. We are talking about
brain interfaces of the future, obviously some of which may get more invasive
yet safe, assuming that engineering around the sensitivity of the brain
improves.

